A RETROSPECT OF 
FORTY YEARS 

1825-1865 



BY 

WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 



EDITED BY HIS DAUGHTER 

HARRIET ALLEN BUTLER 



WITH PORTRAITS AND ILLUSTRATIONS 



NEW YORK 

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 

MCMXI 



.2 



COPYRICHT, IQII, BY 

HARRIET ALLEN BUTLER 




©CI.A3004 32 






K 









/ S3 






ERRATA. 

Page 10. "August 13," should be "August 14." 

11. "From five o'clock in the morning until after six o'clock 
in the evening" should be "From six o'clock in the 
morning until a little before seven o'clock" — "although 
he lived more than a month," should be "although 
lingering for a few days," — "the whole day" should be 
"the conflict." 

" 87. "1843," should be "1846." 

" 212. "1884," " " "1887." 

" 220. "nominee," " " "candidate." 

" 239. Note. After "N. Y. Reports," add "vol. 7." 



~F 



COPYRICHT, IOII, BY 

HARRIET ALLEN BUTLER 



/ 



53 



'? 



TO 

THE GRANDCHILDREN 

FOR WHOM, AT HER REQUEST, THEIR 

GRANDFATHER 

IN THE CLOSING YEARS OF HIS LIFE, AND WITH FAILING 
EYESIGHT, DICTATED THESE 

REMINISCENCES 

THEIR GRANDMOTHER 

MARY RUSSELL BUTLER 

PRESENTS THIS VOLUME 

WITH THE HOPE THAT THE HIGH IDEALS, THE PURITY 

OF LIFE, AND THE DEVOTION TO DUTY WHICH 

CHARACTERIZED HIM WILL EVER BE 

AN INSPIRATION TO THEM 



PREFACE 

In recalling any important undertaking in one's life, 
or in that of another, there is always some especially asso- 
ciated place which stands out with peculiar distinctness. 

Such recollections, as far as this volume is concerned, 
cluster about the corner of a certain old leather-covered 
sofa in that room of our home which has always been 
known as "The Study." There my father, in the early 
days of " Round Oak," pondered legal problems or amused 
the baby on his knee (sometimes doing both simultane- 
ously), and there we can remember him, after his return 
from the city, at the end of a laborious day, still finding 
time and energy to tell his little children the next chapter 
of some thrilling tale which often for weeks and even for 
months would hold them spellbound by the narrator's 
charm and wit. 

On that same sofa do those children, now men and 
women, picture their father in his declining years, and 
there, in time, came the little ones of the next generation 
to listen to famous stories retold and to original fairy tales. 
Often they found him there when for hours he had been 
dictating these reminiscences — reminiscences written at 
the earnest desire of my mother — intended chiefly for his 
grandchildren, never seen by his own eyes, heard by him 

vii 



PREFACE 

only as they fell from his own lips, and in the main never 
read to him for revision. 

As many of my father's most vital memories clustered 
about the Civil War, they naturally led him into a discus- 
sion of its causes; and in this book, besides the narrative 
of my father's early life, will be found a continuous and suc- 
cinct account of the growth of the anti-slavery sentiment. 

In editing at the request of my mother these dictated 
writings, I have endeavored to verify all quotations and 
dates. It has been sometimes necessary to reconstruct 
sentences, to make a few transpositions and to insert a 
few explanatory notes; but nothing has been done that 
would interfere with my father's style or that would 
change the design he had in mind. Only, the deep 
longing remains — that he, himself, had been able to re- 
vise the work, and to bring it to that high degree of 
perfection which invariably characterized his finished 
literary efforts. 

On examining a number of old letters I have found 
much relating to my father's boyhood some of which I 
have incorporated into the narrative. Throughout the 
work I have also scattered selections illustrative of the 
poet nature with which he was so generously endowed. 

It has been thought fitting to add to this volume the 
Memorial read by Judge George C. Holt before the As- 
sociation of the Bar of the City of New York, containing an 
account of the principal cases in which the Lawyer estab- 
lished and sustained his professional reputation. There 
have also been added the Memorials presented and read 

viii 



PREFACE 

before the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court, First 
Department, October 22, 1902, and before the United 
States District Court of the Southern District of New 
York, on behalf of the Admiralty Bar, October 28, 1902; 
and finally the address delivered March 20, 191 1, by the 
Hon. Alton B. Parker, formerly Chief Judge of the Court 
of Appeals of the State of New York, on the occasion of 
the presentation of my father's portrait to that Court, and 
the response of Chief Judge Cullen thereto. 

The editorial labor involved in publishing this "Ret- 
rospect" has been lightened by helpful suggestions from 
other members of the family and a few immediate friends, 
and has been one of mingled pain and happiness to us 
all — pain that came from the absence of him who alone 
could answer many questions arising in the prosecution of 
the work, and happiness in the deep satisfaction of being 
able to give to others what had been prepared for us by 
that vivid memory, brilliant intellect, and loving heart. 

Harriet Allen Butler. 

"Round Oak," Yonkers, N. Y., June 7, 1911. 



IX 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 



INTRODUCTION i 

CHAPTER I.— Birth— Early Home— Revised Statutes and Re- 
visers — Story of the Wonderful Horse — William Howard Allen — 
His Naval Career, Death and Burial — Halleck's Commemora- 
tive Poem — Medad Butler — His Ancestry — Kinderhook Land- 
ing— "The Hill"— The Freshwater Shad 7 

CHAPTER II.— Edward C. D el avan— Temperance and Total Ab- 
stinence — Delavan's Expiatory Libation — Delavan House — A 
Conference on Total Abstinence — The So-called Beer Trial — 
William B. Sprague — Anecdotes — Albany Academy — Dr. Bul- 
lions — Greenbush and Schodack Academy — Cholera Epidemic — 
Trip to Utica 21 

CHAPTER III.— Offers to Benjamin F. Butler of United States 
Senatorship and State Supreme Court Judgeship — His Refusals 
— Bench and Bar of New York — Commission for Settling 
Boundary Line Between New York and New Jersey— Albany 
Regency— Van Buren's Letter— United States Attorney-General- 
ship Offered to Benjamin F. Butler— His Acceptance— Testi- 
monial — Correspondence 33 

CHAPTER IV.— Journey to Washington— Roberts Vaux— Story of 
Franklin's Sawdust Pudding — The Supreme Court — The 
Room — The Judges — William Wirt — Anecdotes — Call on Gen- 
eral Jackson — His Appearance — Washington in 1834 — Social 
Life— Tone of Society— Effect of Slavery— Members of Con- 
gress — The "Swallow-Tailed Gentry" — Foreign Ministry — 
School Life in Washington — School Life in Hudson — Lafayette's 

Wig 46 

xi 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 



CHAPTER V.— Slavery Conditions at National Capital— Results 
of Compromises — Historical Review of Introduction of Slavery 
Into the United States — Birth and Growth of Abolition Senti- 
ment — The Ordinance of 1787 — Compromises of the Constitu- 
tion — Recognition of Slavery by the Constitution — Fugitive 
Slaves — Abolition of Slave-Trade — Louisiana Purchase — Mis- 
souri Compromise — Letter of John Forsyth to Van Buren . . 67 

CHAPTER VI. — William Lloyd Garrison — Incident of John 
Smothers — Story of the Colored Door-Keeper — Bunker's Man- 
sion House in New York — Aaron Burr — New York in 1834 — 
Letter, 1838 — Martin Van Buren — His Career — Inauguration as 
President — Benjamin F. Butler's Resignation of Attorney-Gen- 
eralship — Letter of Felix Grundy 80 

CHAPTER VII.— Charles Butler— Voyage to Europe— Dickens- 
Letter Home, 1838 — Paris — Homeward Voyage Interrupted — A 
"Weller" Anecdote — Trip to Ireland with John Van Buren — 
Rome — Pompeii — Extracts from Journal — Return Home ... 92 

CHAPTER VIII.— United States District Attorneyship of New 
York Offered to Benjamin F. Butler — Accepted — Presidential 
Campaign of 1840 — The "Log-Cabin and Hard-Cider" Frenzy — 
Van Buren's Retirement at Lindenwald — Death of President 
Harrison — George William Curtis — New York University Law 
School — Established by Benjamin F. Butler — Letter of Justice 
Story — Graduation at University of New York in Class of 1843 — 
Class Dinners 105 

CHAPTER IX.— Trip to Nashville— Visit to "The Hermitage"— 
Talks with General Jackson — His Reminiscences — Church Ser- 
vice — The De Witt Clinton Toast — Correspondence with Fitz- 
Greene Halleck — Jefferson Dinner, Toast and Nullification — 
Letter from General Jackson to a Young Man — Annexation of 
Texas a Leading Issue 118 

CHAPTER X.--Retum Trip to Washington— Mammoth Cave- 
Presidential Campaign of 1844 — Defeat of Van Buren — Explo- 
sion on the Princeton — Silas Wright — Secretaryship of War Of- 
fered to Benjamin F. Butler — His Refusal and His Resumption 
of the District Attorneyship in New York — George Bancroft . 140 

xii 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 



CHAPTER XL— Admission to the Bar— Voyage to Europe— " The 
Wanderer" — Entertained at Caen — Paris of 1846 — "Vaucluse" 
— The Young Englishman and the Queen's English — Trip to 
Genoa and Naples — Ascent of Vesuvius — Hotel at Pompeii — 
The Landlord's English — Trip to Sicily — Rome — Pope Pius IX 
— Lepri's Resort of Americans — Powers's "Greek Slave" — 
Titian's "Assumption" — Florence — Venice — Letter Home — 
Berlin — Baron Von Humboldt 151 

CHAPTER XII— London— Breakfast with Samuel Rogers— His 
Table Talk — Letter from Mrs. George Bancroft — Literary 
Celebrities — Contributions to "The Literary World" and "The 
Democratic Review" — Poems of Travel — Return Home — 
Mexican War — Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo — Wilmot Proviso 
— Presidential Campaign of 1848 — Free Soil Party .... 174 

CHAPTER XIIL— First Legal Cases— Discovery of Gold in Cali- 
fornia — The Case of the S. S. Union — The Case of the Ship 
Pacific — Custom-house Case — "The Colonel's Club" — Evert 
and George Duyckinck — "The Sexton and the Thermometer" . 193 

CHAPTER XIV.— Return of Benjamin F. Butler to New York- 
Law Office in Wall Street — A Supply of Office Boys — Successive 
Law Firms — Hiram Barney — Account of Professional Life — 
General Taylor — Henry Clay — His Compromise — John C. Cal- 
houn — Daniel Webster — His Seventh of March Speech — Indig- 
nation in the North — Whittier's "Ichabod" — Death of President 
Taylor — Compromise of 1850 209 

CHAPTER XV— Marriage — A Quaker's Salutation — Reverend 
Samuel Russell — Wedding Trip — Home in 37 East Nineteenth 
Street — Domestic Events — Horace Greeley — P. T. Barnum — 
Jenny Lind — "Barnum's Parnassus" — "Sea Scribblings" — 
American Art Union — Court of Appeals Decision — "Mrs. 
Limber's Raffle" 228 

CHAPTER XVI.— Presidential Campaign of 1852— Franklin Pierce 
— Nathaniel Hawthorne — Constitutionality of Fugitive Slave 
Law — Benjamin F. Butler's Attitude to Free Soil Party — Result 

xiii 



CONTENTS 



PACE 



of Election — World's Fair of 1853— Crystal Palace — Domestic 
£ ven ts — Mrs. Benjamin F. Butler — Her Ancestry — Life — Death 
and Funeral 240 

CHAPTER XVII. — Repeal of Missouri Compromise — Stephen A. 
Douglas — Popular Sovereignty — Kansas-Nebraska Bill — Border 
Ruffians — John Brown — "The Crime Against Kansas" — Assault 
by Brooks on Sumner — Meeting in Broadway Tabernacle — 
Pierre Soule— The "Black Warrior" Episode— Ostend Manifesto 
— Anthony Burns — The Underground Railroad — "Uncle Tom's 
Cabin" 251 

CHAPTER XVIII.— "Nothing to Wear"— Its Genesis— Publication 
and Popularity — A School-girl Claimant — Reviews — Literary 
Work for Harper's — Letter from George William Curtis — Re- 
view by William D. Howells — The Poem 274 

CHAPTER XIX.— Republican Party— Presidential Campaign of 
1856 — President Buchanan — Lecompton Convention — The Eng- 
lish Bill— Trip South with Captain Marshall— "At Richmond" 
—"Two Millions" 298 

CHAPTER XX.— Benjamin F. Butler— His Last Legal Cases- 
Trip to Europe — His Illness — Death and Funeral — Resolu- 
tions — William Curtis Noyes — Evert A. Duyckinck — Samuel 
J. Tilden — His Will — Astor-Lenox-Tilden Foundation . . . 313 

CHAPTER XXL— Dred Scott Case— Douglas and Lincoln Rival 
Candidates for Senator — John Brown's Raid — Lincoln in New 
York — Cooper Union Speech — Visit to Five Points School of 
Industry — Nominations at Chicago Convention — Governor Sew- 
ard — Presidential Campaign of i860 327 

CHAPTER XXII.— President Buchanan Dazed— His Cabinet- 
Secession of South Carolina — Fort Sumter — Lincoln's Inaugura- 
tion — His Cabinet — Relief of Sumter — Opening of the War — 
Hiram Barney — The Proposed Proclamation of Emancipation — 
Attitude of Foreign Governments — England and the Rebellion — 

Privateers 339 

xiv 



CONTENTS 



PAGE 



CHAPTER XXIII.— Home at No 13 East Twelfth Street— Domestic 
Events— Seven Summers at Newburgh— Battle of Bull Run— 
The Union Army— Its High Character— Franklin Butler Crosby 
— Poem on His Death— The Merrimac and The Monitor — The 
Emancipation Proclamation 355 

CHAPTER XXIV.— Death of Martin Van Buren— Funeral at 
Kinderhook — Columbia County Lawyers — Biographical Sketch 
of Martin Van Buren — Presidential Campaign of 1864 — General 
McClellan— Speech of Dr. Tyng— Lincoln Re-elected— Sur- 
render of Lee — Assassination of Lincoln — Grief of a Nation — 
Tom Taylor's Poem in "Punch"— John P. Crosby— His Death 
—Death of Captain Marshall— Memorial— Move to Yonkers— 
"Round Oak"— Home Poems: "Tom Twist," "Somebody"— 
Books and the Library 3 6 5 

APPENDIX.— 

Memorial of William Allen Butler 39 1 

Memorial Proceedings in the Supreme Court 4 T 7 

Memorial Proceedings in the District Court of the United States 424 

Address in the Court of Appeals 427 

INDEX 43i 



XV 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



William Allen Butler Frontispiece 

A portrait painted by Howard Russell Butler, now in the anti-chamber of 
the Court of Appeals, Albany, N. Y. 

FACING PAGE 

Mary Russell Butler [Mrs. William Allen Butler] . . Dedication 
From a photograph, 1910. 

Mabel Jones 16 

From a portrait, now in the possession of Mrs. Helena B. Wainwright, 
Hartford, Conn. 

Medad Butler 64 " 

From a portrait painted about 1825, now in the possession of Miss Emily O 
Butler. 

\^ 
Hannah Tylee Butler 96 

From a portrait painted by Samuel Laurence, now in the possession of Miss 
Emily O. Butler. 

Benjamin Franklin Butler 128 

From a portrait by Thomas Hicks, now in the possession of Mrs. William 
Allen Butler. 

Harriet Allen Butler 160 

From a portrait painted about 1835, now in the possession of Mrs. Mary 
Howard Butler. 

Charles Henry Marshall 194 

From a portrait painted by Thomas Hicks, now in the possession of Mrs. 
William Allen Butler. 

Fidelia Wellman Marshall 224 

From a portrait, now in the possession of Mrs. William Allen Butler, by 
Howard Russell Butler, based on a miniature painted in England, 1825. 

William Allen Butler 256 

From a Carte de visite, 1857. 

xvii 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

FACING PAGE 

Mary Russell Butler [Mrs. William Allen Butler] . . . 286 J 

From a Carte de visile, 1857. 

J 

North View of "Round Oak," 1867 320 

J 
South View of "Round Oak," 1903 352 

View from Terrace of "Round Oak," 1903 ....... 384 



XVII! 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

1825-1865 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

INTRODUCTION 

ENTERING this day, February 20, 1899, on my 
seventy-fifth year, and being by the blessing of Provi- 
dence "of sound mind and memory," as testators have 
been in the habit of saying from time immemorial, " and 
under no restraint" save a somewhat impaired eyesight, 
it seems to me an opportune moment for beginning a 
narrative of some of the events of a long and busy life. 
I am moved to this more by calls, urgent and reiterated, 
from the voices of those nearest and dearest to me, than 
by any decided impulse of my own. 

I believe it is Henri Rochefort, the Parisian journalist, 
who is credited with the cynical remark that when men 
become fit for nothing else they begin to write their remi- 
niscences. This is an apt illustration of the old legal 
maxim "The greater the truth, the greater the libel"; 
for it is only old men who can have any considerable 
store of reminiscence, and it is only when they are disabled 
for the active pursuits of life that they can find solace and 
refuge in memory. It is often said that old men live in 
the past; but would it not be truer to say that the past 

1 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

lives in them, so far as they revive its recollections and 
chronicle its events ? Surely they ought not to be grudged 
this harmless monopoly of reminiscence. 

Fortunately, perhaps, a safeguard against too much 
autobiography is found in the fact that so many personal 
memoirs, begun with good intent, are never carried to 
completion. "Here the manuscript ends," "cetera de- 
sunt," "the rest is wanting" — such are the legends that 
at the foot of the last autobiographic page cut short the 
thread of the personal narrative and leave the story of 
the life unfinished, unless traced by another hand than 
that which began it; and so the field of literature is strewn 
with the fragments of autobiographies. In view of this 
deterring fact, if my personal reminiscences were of any 
public concern or value, I might well take warning from 
an incident in my own experience. 

On one of my last visits to Martin Van Buren, eighth 
president of the United States, at Lindenwald, his coun- 
try home at Kinderhook, N. Y., he told me he had brought 
the rough draft of his autobiography to the date of his 
election to the presidency in 1836. I ventured to urge 
him to pause at this point and revise for publication 
what he had already written, saying to him that he was 
the hero of his own book, and having been elected to 
the presidency of the United States, that was a good place 
to leave himself. "But," said the ex-president, "I 
must vindicate my administration." I replied that there 
were many men who could do that, but no one except 
himself could properly complete the work of revising his 

2 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

manuscript as it stood. I soon found, however, that my 
view could not prevail, and the result justified my appre- 
hensions; for the autobiography was never finished. 

In a sense, what the Bible is to the race, the record of 
every man's life is to himself, a revelation in which he 
may read the designs and dealings of Providence, his 
own human lapses and the divine deliverances. 

The interest we take in our own lives is incommuni- 
cable. Only as they have been linked with other lives 
more potential than our own, can they have any special in- 
terest even to our kindred. In my present retrospective 
essay I have not the aid of diary or journal. Almost the 
only diaries I hold in esteem are those of that garrulous 
old worldling, Pepys, and of the stately and saintly John 
Evelyn. People who attach wonderful importance to 
everything said and done by the dispensers of power 
have for diary-keeping a motive which private persons 
lack. The daily notes of courtiers, officials, statesmen 
and other public functionaries, dealing with the conduct 
of affairs and the making of history, are, in some sort, 
annals of the times, and thus have a reason for existence. 

Long ago I was impressed by the force of Robert Hall's 
recorded disapproval of the habit of keeping a diary, on 
the ground that it tempted to an artificial, insincere tone 
of expression. 1 This objection he made, I think, more 
particularly as to journals of personal experience, relig- 
ious or other, but it is not without weight if generally 
applied. In conversation, in letter-writing, in narrative, 

1 Robert Hall, "Works," 1838 (Memoir by Dr. Gregory). 

3 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

oral or written, there is the naturalness that belongs to 
dealing with men or things outside of our own personality; 
but when individual feeling, opinion and animadversion 
seek expression in the private pages of a diary, it is diffi- 
cult for the writer to be fair and candid even with himself. 

While my own life has been too uneventful and unim- 
portant to justify any extended narrative, it has always 
been an active one, in touch more or less with current 
public affairs and the men concerned in shaping them. 
I may, therefore, be able in these pages to preserve some 
memorabilia serviceable for the gratification of my own 
passion for retrospection and for the preservation of 
some facts and incidents which otherwise would be for- 
gotten or with difficulty recalled to mind. 

Some time ago, while reading a volume of Horace Wal- 
pole's Letters, I came upon certain pages headed "Notes 
of My Life," written by himself for his friends, the Misses 
Berry, containing under date of successive years the lead- 
ing events of his career, entered concisely, somewhat like 
items in a stated account of annual rents. My chance 
acquaintance with this summary of a life, more similar 
to a table of contents than to a sustained biography, has 
induced me to imitate Walpole's commendable example, 
and arrange my retrospective annals under the dates 
of the years to which they belong, regretting only that 
while following this method of Walpole, I cannot bring to 
my pages the vivacity and grace of that charming writer. 1 

1 Although my father's original intention was to follow this chronological 
method of Walpole, he did not carry out the revision of his manuscript far enough 
for the editor to adhere strictly to this plan. — Ed. 

4 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

One object which I hope to keep in view is tracing, 
step by step and year by year, the rise, progress, supremacy 
and destruction of the slave power in the United States — 
from the first alarm and outcry against any agitation in 
the free States of the question of slavery, either on the 
side of morality or politics, through the long and violent 
conflicts in Congress and at the polls, through the period 
of secession and of armed rebellion, to the Proclamation 
of Emancipation, and the downfall of the Confederacy 
at Appomattox. All these successive events I was able to 
watch, with the keenest interest, from no distant point of 
view, either in respect to the political struggle or to the 
fortunes of the Civil War. Notwithstanding all that has 
been written in history, narrative and biography touch- 
ing slavery and its issues, I am inclined to think that the 
present generation of Americans is less informed about the 
growth of anti-slavery sentiment and the causes of its 
final strength in the struggle for the Union than about 
other and earlier periods of our national history. The 
downfall of slavery was like the cataclysm described in 
the Apocalypse, "as it were a great mountain cast into 
the sea"; the turbid waves of time engulfed it, and it dis- 
appeared finally and for ever. Nothing was left of the 
slave-holders' oligarchy but a few plantation melodies 
and some old-time negro dialect stories. 

An intelligent English visitor to this country recently 
made a tour in the South, and fell in with a veteran who 
had outlived the Confederacy, and who had spent much 
of his old age in composing a history of the lost cause, 

5 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

doubtless permeated with lamentation and woe. When 
the work was finished, the veteran told his English friend 
that he gave it to his son, a young man just entering on 
an active career, who, to the father's surprise, returned it 
unread, saying that all its contents must be a sealed book 
to him. The father was looking backward, the son for- 
ward. With the son, as with the great bulk of men born 
since 1861, whether in the North or in the South, slavery 
is a tradition, affording no satisfaction in the retrospect, 
and no inspiration for the future, and obscured by the 
later stirring events which have brought into being a 
national unity such as never before existed. 



CHAPTER I 

BIRTH — EARLY HOME — REVISED STATUTES AND REVISERS — STORY OF THE 
WONDERFUL HORSE — WILLIAM HOWARD ALLEN — HIS NAVAL CAREER, 
DEATH AND BURIAL — HALLECK'S COMMEMORATIVE POEM — MEDAD 
BUTLER — HIS ANCESTRY — KINDERHOOK LANDING — "THE HILL" — 
THE FRESHWATER SHAD. 

THE house, No. 109 State Street, 1 Albany, N. Y., in 
which I was born, February 20, 1825, is of some 
interest to the legal profession. Within its walls, chiefly 
in the front basement, then the law office of my father, 
Benjamin Franklin Butler, was carried on, to a large 
extent, the preparation of "The Revised Statutes of the 
State of New York," one of the most important legal 
works of the nineteenth century. It was a novel, bold 
and successful attempt to bring the whole common law 
of England and all the existing colonial and State statutes 
affecting our commonwealth into a complete and system- 
atic code, based upon scientific principles and sufficient 
for all the needs of government. 

In an address delivered before the Bar Association of 
the City of New York, January 22, 1889, on the occasion 

1 The building still stands, but is no longer used as a private residence. 
On a near-by corner on State Street a bronze tablet has recently been 
placed with the inscription: STATE ST. FORMERLY YONKER, (OR 
GENTLEMAN ST.). It is a curious little coincidence that my father's life, 
of which so much was spent in the city of Yonkers, should have begun on a 
street of the name of Yonker. — Ed. 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

of my presentation to it of portraits of the three revisers, my 
father, John Duer and John C. Spencer, I set forth the 
history of their work from its inception in 1824 to its 
completion in 1830. This address was afterward pub- 
lished under the auspices of the Association, with some 
additions and brief biographical sketches of the revisers, 
under the title of "The Revision of the Statutes of the 
State of New York and the Revisers." Were it possible to 
reproduce on these pages the tributes which came to me 
after the publication of this book from many of the most 
eminent judges and jurists of our country, they would 
bear out to the fullest extent the estimate I had expressed 
of the value and importance of the Revised Statutes. 
They became the model of the statute law of many of 
the States of the Union and remain today the ground- 
work of our existing system of statutory law. 

I have referred at the outset to the Revised Statutes 
and its framers because they are associated with my 
earliest recollections. When I was about four years old 
my father and his co-workers, Messrs. Duer and Spencer, 
were in the habit of taking a brief respite from their 
labors in the latter part of the day for a cup of tea or 
other refreshments. Being the only son, although the fourth 
child, of my parents, I was made an exhibit in the course of 
their interlocutory proceedings, and was on very familiar 
terms with the grave codifiers who were my father's 
guests and to whom I imparted some strange information. 

My father owned a saddle-horse named Diamond, 
who was the object of my unbounded childish admira- 

8 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

tion. Either as the result of my imagination or, more 
likely, the experience of dreamland, I told the revisers in 
perfect simplicity of most extraordinary, preternatural 
and super-equine feats performed by this wonderful horse 
in my presence; amongst others, of his having mounted 
from the sidewalk of State Street up the front wall and 
over the roof of our house descending on Maiden Lane, 
the rear boundary of the premises. Nearly thirty years 
afterward my dim remembrance of these occasions was 
clarified in a somewhat startling way. I had just finished 
a long argument before the General Term of the New 
York Superior Court, of which at that time this same 
John Duer was Chief Justice. The old man — for such 
he had become — lingered a while after the adjournment 
of the court to chat with me and some other lawyers, 
and presently, calling their attention to myself, he said: 
"Would you believe it that this young man, when I first 
knew him, was one of the greatest liars who ever lived ?' ; 
and then went on, fortunately for me, without a break to 
permit a damaging impression, to repeat my juvenile 
story of the exploits of Diamond. The fact that he had 
retained so vivid a recollection of my Munchausen tales 
shows that they must have been told with impressive 
effect. 

I was named for my uncle William Howard Allen, 
the only brother of my mother, whose maiden name was 
Harriet Allen. Their parents, Howard and Lydia Allen, 
came from the island of Nantucket with the colony which 
settled at Hudson, N. Y., at the head of ship navigation 

9 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

of the Hudson River. Their son, William Howard, born 
July 8, 1790, entered the United States Navy as a mid- 
shipman in 1808, was commissioned a lieutenant in 18 13, 
and, entering at once on active service in the war with 
England, was made third in command of the sloop-of- 
war Argus. This vessel of only two hundred and sixty- 
eight tons was destined to achieve a great naval repu- 
tation in the short cruise on which she entered June 18, 
1 8 13, when she sailed from New York having on board 
William H. Crawford, our newly appointed Minister to 
France. By a singular coincidence the commander of 
the Argus, although no relation to my uncle, bore the 
name of William Henry Allen. 

After a voyage of twenty-three days the vessel reached 
L'Orient, and, having refitted, went in search of prizes. 
Spears, the historian of our navy, says: "It was a short 
but brilliant cruise. The Argus sailed on July 14, 1813. 
Ship after ship was taken, some of them right under the 
cliffs of the British coast. Some were sunk and some 
were burned. A few of the more valuable were manned 
and sent to French ports. Indeed, so many prizes were 
taken that the crew became worn out with the work. 
The Argus was at sea but one month and yet twenty 
ships, valued at $2,500,000, were taken in that time." 

On August 13, 1 8 13, while the Argus was in the Irish 
Sea, she was attacked by the British brig Pelican, a war- 
vessel of four hundred and twenty-seven tons, which had 
just put into Cork three days before and hearing of the 
depredations of the Yankee cruiser, had sailed in search 

10 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

of her. Notwithstanding the worn-out condition of his 
men Captain Allen immediately engaged the Pelican and 
one of the most notable sea-fights of the war followed. 
From five o'clock in the morning until after six o'clock 
in the evening the combat raged. Soon after six o'clock 
in the morning Captain Allen was struck by a ball which 
shattered one leg. The leg was amputated after he was 
carried below, and although he lived more than a month, 
he died from the effects of the wound in England, August 
18, 1813. The command devolved on Lieutenant William 
H. Watson; but a few moments later a grape-shot struck 
his head and he was carried below unconscious. The 
command then fell to my uncle, William Howard Allen, 
and he maintained the unequal fight during the whole day 
until the Argus was rendered helpless, and she was sur- 
rendered, almost a complete wreck. 

The surviving officers and men of the Argus were 
taken to England on the Pelican, where, as already men- 
tioned, Captain Allen died. He was buried at Plymouth 
with high military honors, in recognition of his ability as 
a seaman and of his humane treatment of the prisoners 
he had taken during his last cruise. The inadequate 
honor was accorded him at home of having a street in 
the city of New York named for him — Allen Street — 
running from Division Street, northeast to Houston 
Street. My uncle, Lieutenant Allen, was detained at 
Ashburton as a prisoner of war until peace was pro- 
claimed. He was afterward in service on the Flambeau, 
one of the vessels in the squadron of Commodore Decatur 

11 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

on his famous cruise to the Mediterranean in 1815, sig- 
nalized by the abject submission of the Dey of Algiers 
on the quarter-deck of the American commodore's flag- 
ship. The Dey acceded to all his demands for the pro- 
tection of our commerce in the Mediterranean, and re- 
linquished all pretensions to levy tribute on the property 
of American citizens or to reduce them to slavery. 

In 1819 Lieutenant Allen made a cruise in the frig- 
ate Congress as second in command to the Chinese Sea, 
where this vessel, the first of her class which had ever 
visited those waters, excited the wonder and admiration 
of the natives. After these long years of service he at 
last obtained command of a vessel-of-war, the sloop Alli- 
gator, and was sent on the perilous mission of clearing 
the West Indian seas of the pirates who were plundering 
along the coast of Cuba, and, without let or hindrance 
from the weak Spanish Government, making depreda- 
tions on our commerce and holding for ransom the pris- 
oners they captured on our merchant-vessels. 

The Alligator sailed from New York, August 3, 1822, 
and, after a three months' uneventful cruise, entered the 
port of Matanzas, November 9, 1822. As he was about 
to anchor, intelligence reached Lieutenant Allen that a 
gang of pirates had captured an American brig and 
schooner, and were holding their officers for a ransom of 
$7,000 in a neighboring bay about fifteen leagues from 
Matanzas. Without dropping anchor he at once gave 
chase to the pirates, and soon came up with their fleet, 
consisting of three small vessels with a hundred or more 

12 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

men. One of them had the red flag nailed to her mast- 
head. The prizes were at anchor near by. The pirates 
being in water too shallow for the Alligator s draft, her 
commander ordered the boats lowered, and taking charge 
of one of them continued the chase with oars, boarding 
and capturing one of the enemy's vessels. In the des- 
perate encounter which ensued with the remaining ves- 
sels Lieutenant Allen received two musket-shots and 
was carried to the captured vessel, where he died. He 
was buried at Matanzas with military honors. In 1833 
Congress, by resolution, ordered the removal of his re- 
mains to his native city of Hudson, where his fellow 
citizens received them with every tribute of respect and 
affection, and subsequently erected over his grave a 
handsome monument of white marble. The sash, sword 
and epaulets which he wore at the time of receiving his 
fatal wounds hang in my library at "Round Oak" and 
underneath them is the original commission appointing 
him a lieutenant in the navy, dated July 22, 1813, and 
signed by President Madison. 

All the contemporary tributes to Lieutenant Allen's 
memory emphasize his filial devotion to his mother, an 
invalid during the latter part of her life, confined almost 
wholly to her bed, by the side of which her only son, in 
the intervals of his sea service, spent many hours of 
tender ministrations. He was her sole support, and she 
soon followed him to the grave. She died January 7, 
1823. The statement of General James Grant Wilson in 
the "Life and Letters of Halleck" that she lived only a 

13 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

few hours after hearing of her son's death is a mistake. 
Fitz-Greene Halleck, the poet, was a warm friend of my 
uncle. They were born on the same day — July 8, 1790. 
This coincidence strengthened the tie that united them in 
affectionate sympathy. Halleck's lines on the death of 
Lieutenant Allen, first printed in the New York Evening 
Post on December 4, 1822, are among the most beautiful 
productions of his versatile pen. I subjoin them here, 
not only because Halleck is not so much read as he once 
was, but chiefly because they seem to me a fitting close to 
the brief sketch I have given of the brave and noble life 
which they commemorate. 

On the Death of Lieut. William Howard Allen 
of the American Navy 

He has been mourned as brave men mourn the brave, 
And wept a«s nations weep their cherished dead, 
With bitter, but proud tears, and o'er his head 
The eternal flowers whose root is in the grave, 
The flowers of Fame, are beautiful and green; 
And by his grave's side pilgrim feet have been, 
And blessings, pure as men to martyrs give, 
Have there been breathed by those he died to save. 
— Pride of his country's banded chivalry, 
His fame their hope, his name their battle-cry; 
He lived as mothers wished their sons to live, 
He died as fathers wish their sons to die. 
If on the grief-worn cheek the hues of bliss, 
Which fade when all we love is in the tomb, 
Could ever know on earth a second bloom, 
The memory of a gallant death like his 
Would call them into being; but the few 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Who as their friend, their brother, or their son, 
His kind warm heart and gentle spirit knew, 
Had long lived, hoped, and feared for him alone; 
His voice their morning music, and his eye 
The only starlight of their evening sky, 
Till even the sun of happiness seemed dim, 
And life's best joys were sorrows but with him; 
And when, the burning bullet in his breast, 
He dropt, like summer fruit from off the bough, 
There was one heart that knew and lov'd him best — 
It was a mother's — and is broken now. 

In an address which I delivered May 15, 1877, on the 
occasion of the unveiling by President Hayes of the Hal- 
leck monument in Central Park, I referred to the above 
elegiac poem as kindred in spirit to the "Lycidas" of 
Milton. For this I was roundly scored by a newspaper 
critic of the day, but on perusing it after the lapse of many 
years I am not inclined to recant my encomium. 

Halleck's friendship for my uncle was continued on 
my behalf. At the time of writing the poem just quoted, 
he was in the employ of Jacob Barker, the most noted 
member of the Nantucket family of that name, a shipping 
merchant in New York, of whom I shall have more to 
say hereafter. Halleck in later years was a confidential 
and trusted clerk of John Jacob Astor. On his retire- 
ment in 1849 he lived at Guilford, Conn., making occa- 
sional visits to New York, where I sometimes met him at 
Downing's oyster-cellar in the sub-basement of the build- 
ing on the east side of Broad Street just below Wall Street, 
a famous rendezvous of the business men of that vicinity, 

15 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

and there, over a narrow table and moderate repast, we 
held pleasant converse. He died November 19, 1867. 

Although in my maturer years I gratefully appreciated 
the association of my own name with that of my uncle, 
William Howard Allen, it was in my early boyhood a 
source of grief to me that my parents had not given me 
the Christian name of my paternal grandfather — Medad. 
He was the third in lineal descent from Jonathan Butler, 
a settler at Saybrook, Conn., in the year 1724. His 
fourth son, Ezekiel Butler, married Mabel Jones, of Say- 
brook, a descendant of Colonel John Jones, one of the 
regicides beheaded October 17, 1660, who is said to have 
married for his second wife a sister of Oliver Cromwell. 1 

After naming their first two sons respectively Ezekiel 
and Elias, they found a name for my grandfather in 
Numbers 11 : 26 and christened him " Medad. " The re- 
sult of this whimsical choice was that no one of his nu- 
merous male descendants ever bore his Christian name. 
He was very fond of me and in the affectionate devotion 
which I returned to him I included an ardent wish to bear 
his name, carrying this preference so far, if I rightly re- 
member, as occasionally to sign my name or at least 
indulge myself in writing it as a counterpart of his. 2 

1 Colonel John Jones's first wife was Margaret Edwards. She died in 1651 and 
was the mother of all his children. He had no children by his second wife.— Ed. 

* A work which my father undertook as a labor of love for his entire family 
and which involved much arduous preparation was "The Book of the Family 
and Lineal Descendants of Medad Butler," which contains the names of all 
the descendants of his grandfather ingeniously classified according to genera- 
tion and family, with details of parentage, age, marriages and deaths, down to 
the date of the publication of the book in 1887.— Ed. 

l6 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Much of my early life was spent with my grand- 
father at Kinderhook Landing, where he had come from 
Branford, Conn., in 1787. Before my birth he had pro- 
cured the requisite authority to change the name of the 
place to "Stuyvesant," in honor of Peter Stuyvesant, the 
valorous governor of New York immortalized in Irving's 
"Knickerbocker." He built a modest homestead on the 
east side of the highway leading from Kinderhook Land- 
ing as originally settled, to the village of Kinderhook, five 
miles distant inland. This place was called by the vil- 
lagers "The Hill," and in general parlance the definite 
article was also associated with my grandfather, who was 
known as "The Judge," he being for many years a county 
judge and in the latter part of his life the first judge of 
Columbia County. 

"The Hill" was somewhat singular in situation. A 
sharp rise of ground from the highway was surmounted by 
a plateau on which the house stood facing the river, 
reached by flights of steps. Half-way up the ascent was 
a large oak tree affording a resting-place for the pedes- 
trian. From the house a level roadway led to the north- 
ward and intersected the highway at the top of the hill; 
to the south were flower-beds and a vegetable garden. 
In the rear of the house the land again rose and was occu- 
pied by an apple orchard, one of the old-fashioned Co- 
lumbia County style, which no cold of winter or drought 
of summer could ever injuriously affect. It yielded its 
annual supply regardless of these climatic conditions which 
in our degenerate days appear to be so fatal to fruit crops 

17 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

in every part of the country. On the north side of the 
orchard a lane led up the hill to the eastern boundary of 
the place. From the house and every part of the garden 
there was a view of the river extending northward for 
several miles, and southward for a shorter distance but 
terminated in that direction by the range of the Catskill 
Mountains, which formed a most picturesque back- 
ground. 

The happiest recollections of my boyhood are associ- 
ated with this quiet spot and the home life of my grand- 
parents. At what was called the " Upper Landing," 
which had superseded the " Lower Landing" as a center 
of trade, there were warehouses and a line of barges for 
the transportation to New York of the produce of the in- 
terior of the county, which, before the building of the 
Hudson River Railroad, was exported by this means; and 
there was a good deal of business and bustle along the 
river-front. The post-office was a center of attraction, 
and the arrival of the mail furnished a mild excitement. 

My grandfather was the "First Citizen" in the little 
village community, where his will and word were quite 
paramount and authoritative, and his actual magistracy 
potential in securing its good order. He was a man of 
striking figure, tall, erect and vigorous; a man of strong 
character and decided opinions. He was devoted to the 
care of his garden, which, like the apple orchard, seemed 
to be safe against all the vicissitudes of the seasons or the 
unfriendliness of nature, and was an unfailing source of 
supply from early spring to late autumn. This garden 

18 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

was indispensable, because the market facilities of Stuy- 
vesant were exceedingly limited, and the opportunities 
for securing fresh meat of any kind infrequent. On 
this account the shad season had a peculiar interest. At 
that time shad, which were of very fine quality, easily 
found their way in large numbers as far north as Stuy- 
vesant. 

I recall a story told of my grandfather in connection 
with this special subject which is characteristic of his sense 
of justice and the kind of grim humor he associated with 
it. There were on "The Hill" two perennial springs of 
pure water: one near the house, which gave a supply 
for all the ordinary uses of the family; the other lower 
down, not so commonly used. Drawing water from the 
latter spring one morning in the shad season, my grand- 
father perceived a strong fishy flavor in the usually pure 
water. Mistrusting the cause, he arose at an unusually 
early hour the next morning, went to the spring, and in 
its clear water found, suspended by a string, a large shad 
which had evidently been placed there overnight for pres- 
ervation and cooling. Simultaneously my grandfather's 
neighbor appeared on the further side of the fence which 
separated his properties from "The Hill." Before he 
could say a word my grandfather called out to him that 
he had had a wonderful piece of luck and had actually 
caught a shad in his spring, holding it up in full view. 
The detected neighbor had not the courage to assert his 
right of property in the shad, well knowing that this would 
be conclusive proof that he had been guilty of a trespass, 

J 9 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

and my grandfather walked home with his fish as law- 
ful prize. 

I have often regretted that it was not possible to re- 
tain this homestead, with all its delightful associations, 
in our family, but after the opening of the Hudson River 
Railroad the river traffic of Stuyvesant was quite destroyed. 
My grandparents' age and infirmities compelled them to 
leave the place and to live in their extreme old age in 
homes of their children, none of whom could by any pos- 
sibility make a residence at "The Hill," and so it passed 
to new owners and went gradually to decay. My grand- 
father died in the city of New York, February 27, 1847, 
aged eighty-one, and my grandmother 1 at Stuyvesant, 
September 11, 1856, aged eighty-three. 

'Medad Butler married, in 1794, at Kinderhook Landing, Hannah Tylee, 
daughter of Samuel Tylee and Hannah Emmons. 



ADDITION 

Appearing in Second Edition. 

Add to note. "Twelve children were born of this mar- 
riage, of whom my grandfather, Benjamin Franklin But- 
ler was the eldest, and of whom only six survived in- 
fancy. On page 16 ante my father states that no one of 
Medad Butler's numerous male descendants ever bore 
his Christian name. As a matter of fact, Walter Butler, 
the third son of Medad Butler, named one of his twelve 
children "Charles Medad Butler." The child lived but 
three months and the fact was naturally forgotten." 



20 



CHAPTER II 

EDWARD C. DELAVAN — TEMPERANCE AND TOTAL ABSTINENCE — DELA- 
VAN'S EXPIATORY LIBATION — DELAVAN HOUSE — A CONFERENCE ON 
TOTAL ABSTINENCE — THE SO-CALLED BEER TRIAL — WILLIAM B. 
SPRAGUE — ANECDOTES — ALBANY ACADEMY — DR. BULLIONS — GREEN- 
BUSH AND SCHODACK ACADEMY — CHOLERA EPIDEMIC — TRIP TO UTICA. 

A MONG the men of note in Albany whom I knew 
* *■ when a boy and with whom my friendship continued 
during all their lives was Edward C. Delavan, known all 
the civilized world over as a foremost and persistent ad- 
vocate of total abstinence and prohibition. It is stated 
in Appleton's "Cyclopedia of American Biography" that 
he was a wine-merchant. Whether he acquired his fort- 
une in that business or by successful operations in real 
estate or other ventures, I do not know, but when as a boy 
I first became acquainted with him he had retired from 
business and was engaged in good works. He was then 
living on Washington Street, north of the Capitol, in one 
of the finest houses in Albany. In his earlier efforts for 
the promotion of temperance, in which he was associated 
with Dr. Eliphalet Nott, the president of Union College, 
my father cooperated with great vigor and zeal. The 
movement was directed against the use of ardent spirits as 
a beverage, a reform greatly needed, but nowhere more 
than in Albany, to which, as the capital of the State, the 

21 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

legislature, the courts and the administrative offices drew 
citizens from all parts of the commonwealth. 

A general indulgence in strong drink was one of the 
serious evils of the time. The temperance societies or- 
ganized in connection with this good work were numerous 
and accomplished excellent results. Mr. Delavan, how- 
ever, was not satisfied with what he considered only the 
first step in a radical reform, and he reached the con- 
clusion that the scriptural rule of conduct for all right- 
minded Christian men was not temperance but total ab- 
stinence. As a practical and public attestation of the 
sincerity of his belief he one day took from his cellar all 
his fine wines and liquors, and, emptying bottle after 
bottle, poured their contents as an expiatory libation into 
the gutter of the street in front of his house, whence they 
flowed down the hill in the direction of the Capitol. 
From that day till his death, he was the unflinching foe 
of all intoxicants, denouncing their use even for the most 
sacred purposes, but was not always as successful as he 
meant to be in the enforcement of his principles. 

When Mr. Delavan built the Delavan House, in- 
tended to be, as it soon became, the leading hotel in the 
State capital, he determined that no intoxicants should 
be permitted within its walls or served to its guests, and 
when he executed a long lease to the tenant who became 
the proprietor of the hotel, he took special pains to insert 
a prohibitory covenant to accomplish this object. He 
omitted, however, to include a provision for forfeiture in 
case of a breach of this covenant, and so when the tenant 

22 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

soon afterward broke it by setting up a bar and supply- 
ing his guests with wine, ale and all other beverages com- 
mon to ordinary hotels, Mr. Delavan's only remedy was 
an action for damages for the breach of the covenant. 
Inasmuch, however, as the tenant could easily prove that 
not only no damage ensued from his act, but the in- 
creased revenues of the hotel made the payment of the 
rent more secure, no damages, or at least, only nominal 
damages were recoverable; and so until the Delavan 
House sank into a shapeless mass of ruins under the blaze 
of a destructive fire in 1895, it stood as a memorial of the 
name, but in no sense of the principles, of its builder. 

My father, while always most temperate even to ab- 
stinence, could not follow Mr. Delavan in his extreme 
views, and never adopted them. This was a source of 
great grief to Mr. Delavan, who in his endeavor to enlist 
my father in his new departure used all available means, 
including an article on the supposed Scriptural rule of 
abstinence, written by a certain English clergyman, named 
Edwin James. The argument was based in part on the 
statement that wherever wine was mentioned in Holy 
Writ it was always condemned, except when the unfer- 
mented juice of the grape was intended to be designated. 
The author of this article was the editor of the Temper- 
ance Recorder, published in Albany under Mr. Delavan's 
supervision. 

Anticipating that an interview between Dr. James and 
my father would result in the latter's giving his adhesion 
to the dictum of total abstinence, Mr. Delavan arranged 

23 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

for such a meeting. My father readily assented to the 
interview, but during the interval preceding it went 
through the Scriptures with a view to noting every in- 
stance in which, according to the authorized version, the 
word "wine" was used either with approval or with 
condemnation. I well remember his being engaged dur- 
ing some summer Sundays in the task. He was not a 
Hebrew scholar but his object in the compilation of texts 
was to enable him to test the accuracy of the statements 
in Dr. James's book by calling upon him to explain the 
meaning and use of the Hebrew word in the several texts 
from which my father had taken the English equivalent. 
Thus prepared for the conference with Dr. James, he 
met that gentleman with a result quite unexpected to 
him and to the friend who had brought them together. 
Mr. Delavan himself gave me an account of the interview 
many years after its occurrence, not, indeed, till after my 
father's death, and later, in 1866, at my request wrote the 
particulars of it which I give. 

After speaking of the interest with which he had 
looked forward to the conference of "two learned Chris- 
tian men" on this subject, he continued: 

"I saw that if Dr. James could be sustained the cause 
would be placed on the most impregnable basis, on God's 
Word, and nothing could overthrow it. 

" For some time it appeared that all things were going 
on smoothly to sustain Dr. James, but all at once your 
father read a text where 'Yayin' was introduced. 'Now 
tell me, Dr. James,' said your father, 'does Yayin here 

24 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

mean intoxicating wine?' I saw at once my friend 
Dr. James appeared to be confused if not confounded. 
The blood rushed to his face and he declined to answer 
to your father's satisfaction, who at once rolled up his 
papers and left the office, and I have no doubt he then 
made up his mind we must look elsewhere than to the 
Bible as authority for total abstinence as a duty. I 
deeply regretted at the time that Dr. James had not 
been more candid and acknowledged that the text re- 
ferred to by your father did appear to militate against 
his position and that he must examine still further into 
the question. But as this was not done, your father, I 
conclude, felt that Dr. James was unwilling to ac- 
knowledge an error, and that his position could not be 
sustained." 

Mr. Delavan went on in his letter to claim that Dr. 
James's contention was substantially correct, although he 
failed to make it good on the occasion referred to, and that 
the "Christian world has been misled on the 'wine ques- 
tion' through the English translation of the Bible." In 
closing he said: "I once stated to you the substance of 
this letter, but I conclude this reminiscence of the past 
will not be uninteresting to you and I send it. I think the 
interview between Dr. James and your father at my 
office was a third of a century ago. I am, my dear 
sir, your friend, as I was your father's, Edward C. 
Delavan." 

Albany society was stirred to its depths in the spring 
of 1840 by the so-called "Beer Trial" in a suit brought 

25 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

against Mr. Delavan for libel by John Taylor, the pro- 
prietor of a great brewing establishment on the hill in 
the upper part of the city. Mr. Delavan became respon- 
sible for the statement made in the Albany Evening Jour- 
nal in February, 1835, that the water which supplied Tay- 
lor's Brewery was taken from stagnant pools, gutters and 
ditches, and even often from puddles covered with filth, 
in which there were dead animals. For the publication 
of the alleged libelous charges Mr. Taylor claimed to 
recover $70,000 damages. Mr. Delavan accepted the 
challenge of the plaintiff, alleging the truth of the state- 
ments made in the Evening "Journal. 

At the trial the most eminent lawyers in Albany ap- 
peared for the respective parties. It was severely con- 
tested. Judge Cushman, before whom the case was 
tried, made an elaborate charge to the jury, in which he 
told them that the publications in question were calcu- 
lated to do the plaintiff great injury in his business and 
character; that the defendant was proved to be a man 
of large wealth, a fact which the jury might take into 
consideration in deciding on the amount of their verdict 
should it be given for the plaintiff. He charged them, 
however, that if the defense had been made out to their 
satisfaction, the defendant would be entitled to a verdict, 
as any citizen is at liberty to publish the truth, especially as 
to facts which ought to be known to the community at 
large. After a consultation of about an hour, the jury 
rendered a verdict for the defendant, a great triumph 
for Mr. Delavan. 

26 






A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Another conspicuous figure in Albany life, always be- 
fore me on Sundays and often on week-days, with whom 
I continued in close relations of friendship till his death, 
in 1876, was Dr. William B. Sprague, the pastor of the 
Second Presbyterian Church, in Chapel Street, where 
he preached for many years to a congregation which in- 
cluded very many of the worthiest and most influential 
citizens of Albany. 

He was a very fluent writer, with a somewhat florid 
style, but always clear and forcible. He is known as an 
author by his work, "Annals of the American Pulpit," 
and many minor publications, his memorial sermons be- 
ing very numerous. He was a man of rather impressive 
presence, very sensitive to public opinion or criticism, but 
strong in the defense of his own views and warm in his 
personal friendships. His deference to the supposed 
views of those of his fellow-citizens whom he respected, 
is illustrated by a story, which lingers in my memory, of 
a practical joke of which he was the victim. Some Albany 
wag had wagered or asserted that he could procure a 
petition signed by some prominent Albanians praying 
that Dr. Sprague be hanged, and the doctor himself 
would sign it. And according to the story the doctor did 
sign it, at sight of the respectable names appearing on 
the paper, without troubling himself to read its contents. 
Very likely this was an ancient joke adapted to a modern 
use, according to the immemorial usage of story-tellers. 
In my own reading I remember to have found the oft- 
repeated legend which tells how William the Conqueror 

27 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

on landing in England stumbled and fell but, instantly 
grasping a handful of earth, rose to his feet exclaiming 
that he had taken the English soil in fee, related in almost 
identical terms by Suetonius of the first Caesar. 

A better-attested story of Dr. Sprague, and bear- 
ing an undoubted ear-mark of authenticity, is that after 
the birth of one of his younger sons he was for some time 
in doubt as to what name he should give him, and the 
matter, as usual in such cases, was a subject of family 
discussion. Late one evening the good doctor, who was 
a warm friend and great admirer of Ambrose Spencer, 
the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the State, 
knocked at the door of his eldest daughter, who had re- 
tired, and called out to her that he had decided on a 
name for her little brother, announcing that it was to be 
"Ambrose Spencer Sprague." A faint voice from within 
responded, "Father, think of the initials." The doctor 
retired and another name had to be discovered. 1 

Besides his pulpit and pastoral work and his literary 
labors, Dr. Sprague was an indefatigable collector of 
autographs. His activities in this direction covered both 
hemispheres and he accumulated a vast collection of val- 
uable documents and letters, making it one of the best 
in the United States. While Dr. Sprague was also a 
warm friend of the temperance movement, he, too, parted 
company with Mr. Delavan on the question of total 
abstinence. He was a devoted friend of my father, at 

1 The "little brother" referred to, now a well-known lawyer practising in the 
city of New York, was finally named for Edward Everett, the famous orator and 
intimate friend of Dr. Sprague. — Ed. 

28 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

whose funeral he delivered a most tender and beautiful 
eulogy. 

The Albany Academy is one of the few ancient 
landmarks of the city that have not yet been removed. 
At an early age I was a pupil within its walls, and the 
instruction in Latin which my father had begun to give 
me when I was seven years old was continued by Doctor 
Bullions, a classical teacher of repute, author of several 
text-books, and vigorous with the use of the rattan, the 
infliction of which I escaped more by the reason of my 
tender years than by any proficiency in my studies. 

[Although it is not mentioned in his reminiscences, we 
find from letters passing between his parents that in the 
spring of 1832 my father was sent to the Greenbush and 
Schodack Academy. He remained but a short time. His 
speedy return home may have been due to his extreme 
youth, which could not endure a separation from his 
family. We find his father writing to his mother about 
three weeks after the child had been sent away, "It 
grieves me to hear that our dear boy has suffered so much. 
He shall not stay where he is homesick. But it is best not 
to be too hasty in taking him away, lest a permanent 
injury should be done to him, as I suppose sooner or 
later he will be obliged to leave the parental wing and to 
inure himself to the pain of separation. As soon as I re- 
turn (which I pray may be soon) we will go out to see 
the dear little fellow and do then what circumstances 
may require. " 

Circumstances did require my father's removal from 
the school, as about that time cholera broke out in Albany 
and my grandfather moved his family to the then famous 
Albany hotel, Congress Hall. All of this we learn from a 
letter written by the "dear little fellow" of seven to his 
aunt, Mrs. Nathan Chamberlin, then residing in Hudson: 

29 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Albany, July 21st, 1832 
My Dear Aunt: 

I suppose you enjoy yourself very much in Hudson, 
but I can assure you that we are very lonesome without 
you. We would be very glad indeed to see you. 

The cholera, as I suppose you know, is making con- 
siderable havoc here. There has been to-day as some say 
46 cases and 15 deaths; but there has been but 40 cases 
and 1 1 deaths reported. We are quite prisoners here, for 
we cannot go very far from the house for fear of this disease. 

It is delightful up at Congress Hall; we have fine 
rooms, and every enjoyment we could wish for. Mr. H. 
sends his love and says if he leaves Albany on account of 
the cholera he will probably come to Hudson where he 
will have the pleasure of seeing you. That he is not 
married yet but hopes he will be at this time next year 
that is if he has good luck. Martin says that when he 
finds how much love he possesses he will give you half. 
He also says that when the weather gets cooler he will 
try to get down to Hudson if you do not make your ap- 
pearance in this quarter before then, which he sincerely 
hopes you will. He wishes to be kindly remembered 
to your husband. 

But I must go back to myself. I do not go to 
school at present. I went for a short time to the Green- 
bush and Schodack Academy, but Father took me away 
for he thought that in the present state of things it would 
be pleasanter to have me at home; neither do any of the 
rest of us attend school. Dr. Lacey has been married to 
Miss Smith who you remember Harriet and Mary went 
to school to. Dr. Lacey's family have removed to Pitts- 
burg in Pennsylvania. They started on Thursday last. 
Several families have left town. Judge VanderpoePs 
family have gone to Kinderhook. 

We all send our love to you and our uncle. Believe 
me dear Aunt your 

Affectionate Nephew 

W. H. A. Butler. 

30 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

In the summer of 1833 my father took what was doubt- 
less his first journey of any consequence, when he and his 
sister Mary 1 accompanied their father on one of his 
frequent professional trips. This time it was a cause at 
Utica in which my grandfather's services were required, 
and as his sister had married Dr. Charles B. Coventry 
of that town it was arranged that the children should 
pay their relatives a visit while their father stayed at the 
still well-known Bagg's Hotel. At this period the jour- 
ney from Albany to Utica took almost twenty-four hours, 
first by coach to Schenectady and then by canal to Utica. 

My grandfather writes on July 3, 1833: — 

"We had a pleasant ride to Schenectady. Although 
the weather was warm the carriage was not crowded and 
we got along extremely well. Whilst staying at Schenec- 
tady the heat seemed to increase with a constant progress, 
so that when we came to be stowed into the canal boat 
we soon found ourselves in a roasting condition. How- 
ever, we made out to stand it pretty well, especially as 
we had the benefit of a change in the temperature toward 
evening. I could not but enjoy the sail along the beau- 
tiful valley of the Mohawk when I witnessed the gratifi- 
cation and enjoyment of our dear children. William 
thought the canal boat the pleasantest mode of travelling 
he had ever known, — and Mary was evidently pleased 
with the fine scenery through which we constantly passed. 
Both behaved extremely well, so that I had reason to be 
proud of their appearance and conduct. 

"Will slept soundly but woke at break of day and 
immediately quit his bed to see the locks, etc., at Little 
Falls, some of which Mary had also an opportunity of 
seeing, though she did not rise so early as her brother. 

"The heat was intense again yesterday morning, so 
that we were greatly relieved when the hour came to land 
at Utica. Finding that Dr. Coventry lived very near 
the canal, at the entrance of the village, I stopped with 

1 Afterward the wife of Daniel DeForest Lord. 

31 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

the children and safely deposited them with their aunt 
before I went to Bagg's. 

"We reached Utica at 12 o'clock and before one there 
came up a prodigiously severe rain storm, so that I could 
not but recollect the old remark which I have had so 
many occasions to reiterate, that Utica is the most rainy 
place in the State. ... 

"The boys have just begun to fire crackers, the liberty 
pole has been hoisted and the flag unfurled so that we are 
admonished that the 4th of July is approaching." 

Two days later my father writes to his mother of the 
continued celebration and humorously mentions that 
"Day before yesterday (the fourth) I went to the First 
Presbyterian Church to hear some gentlemen speak 
among whom was Mr. B. F. Butler who made a very fine 
address." — Ed.] 



32 



CHAPTER III 

OFFERS TO BENJAMIN F. BUTLER OF UNITED STATES SENATORSHIP AND 
STATE SUPREME COURT JUDGESHIP — HIS REFUSALS — BENCH AND BAR 
OF NEW YORK — COMMISSION FOR SETTLING BOUNDARY LINE BETWEEN 
NEW YORK AND NEW JERSEY — ALBANY REGENCY — VAN BUREN'S 
LETTER — UNITED STATES ATTORNEY-GENERALSHD? OFFERED TO BEN- 
JAMIN F. BUTLER — HIS ACCEPTANCE — TESTIMONIAL — CORRESPOND- 
ENCE. 

I WELL remember the day in the latter part of 1833 
when my father told us he had sold the house in State 
Street to Mr. Joel Rathbone, a leading merchant of Al- 
bany, and that we were to go to Washington and would 
probably never return to Albany. And so it proved. 
He had refused to consider the United States senator- 
ship, although election by the legislature to this office 
had been urgently pressed upon him in 1833. He never 
would take any office except a purely professional one. 
Mr. Van Buren, in whose office my father had studied 
law, whose partner he became, and to whose business 
he had succeeded when his former chief entered the Cab- 
inet of President Jackson in 1828 as Secretary of State, 
was very solicitous that my father should come to Wash- 
ington and be identified with the administration. 

But my parents, especially my mother, strongly ob- 
jected to breaking up their home in Albany. My father 
had attained the highest rank in his profession and oc- 

33 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

cupied a unique position as the foremost counsel in the 
Court of Errors, or more properly the Court for the Cor- 
rection of Errors, as our court of last resort in this State 
was then termed. This is easily attested by the fact 
that in the session held in 1833 in New York, of the whole 
number of eighteen cases, reported in the eleventh volume 
of Wendell's Reports, he was counsel in nine and these 
of the first importance. In a home letter, written during 
his attendance at this term of the court, he says that he is 
glad to have an associate counsel in one of his many 
cases, as he fears the court will weary of continuously 
hearing arguments by himself. 

His relations at this time to the bench and bar of the 
State were particularly agreeable. The means of access 
to the capital from remote and interior points, and, dur- 
ing the winter season, even from New York, were so in- 
adequate in comparison with those now existing, that a 
journey to Albany was a serious affair. The employ- 
ment of local counsel at the sessions of the courts held at 
Albany was far more frequent then than now, and of the 
practice thus created he enjoyed a very large share. His 
position in this regard was similar to that afterward 
enjoyed by Nicholas Hill, one of the brightest ornaments 
of the bar of this State, and its most conspicuous leader 
in the court of last resort. 

Governor Marcy desired to appoint my father to the 
bench of the Supreme Court, as successor to Judge Suth- 
erland, who had resigned his place on the bench owing 
to the inadequacy of the salary and accepted the more 

" 34 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

lucrative office of clerk of the court. Chief Justice 
Savage, who presided in the court during the whole 
period of the revision and for six years after its com- 
pletion, wrote my father a letter communicating the offer, 
and urging its acceptance in these words of warm per- 
sonal friendship: "The office of judge, permit me to 
say, is one to which you are well adapted; and in which 
you can render as great service to your native State as in 
any other. It is one in which you will probably enjoy 
as much human happiness as any other, and in which 
you will have as much leisure for literary pursuits, per- 
haps, as in the duties of an arduous profession; and sup- 
posing you to have, as all members of the profession ought 
to have, a laudable ambition for an elevated standing as 
a jurist and scholar, in which of the walks of learning 
can you have a better field for the exercise of your powers ? 
This is a subject on which I need not attempt to persuade 
you; you must act as your judgment directs. I will only 
remark further, that should you accept the office, there 
is every probability that in a few years at furthest you 
will preside over the court. And I need not inform you 
that, in my estimation, that station is as honorable as any 
in our State, and is surpassed by but few in the United 
States." 

The Chief Justice, however, with the candor and fair- 
ness which characterized him, did not fail to point out 
to his friend that unless he already had money in his 
purse sufficient for his future wants, the judicial office was 
to be shunned. The want of a proper compensation for 

35 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

his services had driven Judge Sutherland from the bench 
which he adorned, and the Chief Justice, referring to this 
circumstance, says, "The cause of that resignation is 
rather calculated to deter those who are most competent 
to fill the vacancy from accepting the station. Indeed, 
if a man wishes to be rich he should become so before he 
ascends the bench." 

The meager pittance then allowed by the State to our 
Supreme Court judges was of itself a bar to the accept- 
ance of judicial office by any man with a large family 
and an ample professional practice, and so the place on 
the bench was declined. Fortunately for the State, an 
incumbent was found so situated as to be able to accept 
the vacant seat, and endowed with rare judicial qualities. 
The long and conspicuous career of Samuel Nelson in the 
Supreme Court of the State, and afterward in the Su- 
preme Court of the United States, was one of the most 
noted examples of eminence and fidelity in the annals 
of the American judiciary. 

In February, 1833, Peter A. Jay and my father, both 
of New York, were appointed, with Theodore Frelinghuy- 
sen, of New Jersey, a commission to settle the contro- 
versy of half a century's duration as to the boundary line 
between the two States, a service resulting in the con- 
vention which has ever since controlled the jurisdiction 
and rights of these States as respects their boundary 
line. 1 

1 The convention was dated September 16, 1833, and is found in the Sessions 
Laws of New York, 1834, p. 8. It was confirmed by Act of Congress, June 28, 
1834, 4 Stat, at Large, 708, and has been construed several times by the Supreme 

36 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Meanwhile, repeated overtures came to my father 
from Washington, through Mr. Van Buren, looking to 
his acceptance of office in the administration of General 
Jackson. These were declined as often as they were 
renewed, until, in the great political struggle between the 
national administration and the Bank of the United 
States, the summons to Washington seemed so impera- 
tive that it could not be refused without apparently plac- 
ing personal considerations above public duty. 

Up to this time the whole tenor of his life had been 
undisturbed by any influence foreign to his position as a 
leader of the bar of his native State and to an active in- 
terest in the stirring public questions of the time. His 
friendship for Mr. Van Buren had kept him in close 
alliance with the political party of which his former part- 
ner was the acknowledged head, and in co-operation with 
Governor Marcy, Edwin Croswell, Azariah C. Flagg, 
Silas Wright, John A. Dix, and other leading public men 
of the capital, who, from their union in political action, 
had acquired the sobriquet of the " Albany Regency." 
They have been maligned as the prototype of machine 
politicians, but there never was a more groundless charge. 
They were associated not only for the promotion of party 
interest but mainly for the sake of the principles which 
their party represented. They reaped no pecuniary ad- 
Court, one decision being as late as April, 1908, in the case of the Central Rail- 
road Company of New Jersey v. Jersey City, 209 U. S. 473. 

The Commissioners for New York were Benj. F. Butler, Peter Augustus Jay, 
and Henry Seymour. The Commissioners for New Jersey were Theodore 
Frelinghuysen, James Parker, and Lucius Q. C. Elmer.— Ed. 

37 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

vantages for themselves from their combination touching 
public affairs. 1 

No one of them grew rich or advanced his personal 
fortune by his connection with the affairs of state. I be- 
lieve that the unifying force which held them together 
and made them a power in the State, was the identity of 
their views as to the true principles of government and 
the duties imposed upon citizens. Their unselfish and 
undeviating personal regard for Mr. Van Buren was 
something remarkable and rare in political friendships. 

1 Referring to the appointments of State officers by Governor DeWitt Clinton 
during his second term of office from 1820 to 1823, DeAlva S. Alexander in his 
"Political History of the State of New York," published 1906, makes the follow- 
ing statement about the Albany Regency. — Ed. 

"The appointment of Talcott, Marcy and Butler, changed the existing po- 
litical system. Prior to their activity, the distribution of patronage depended 
largely upon the local boss. His needs determined the men who, regardless of 
their personal fitness, should be given office. But Talcott and his colleagues in- 
troduced new methods, with a higher standard of political morality, and a better 
system of party discipline. They refused to tolerate unworthy men, and when 
the little souls stormed and raged, their wise counsels silenced the selfish and 
staggered the boss. Gradually, their control of patronage and of the party's 
policy became so absolute that they were called the 'Albany Regency.' It was, 
at first, simply a name given them by Thurlow Weed; there was neither organi- 
zation nor legal authority. Power came from their great ability and high purpose. 

"The Albany Regency was destined to continue many years, and to number 
among its members men of character and great influence. 

"But the men who organized the Regency, giving it power and the respect of 
the people, by refusing to do what their fine sense of honor did not approve, were 
Talcott, Marcy and Butler. It was as remarkable a trio as ever sat about a 
table. 

"In the passing of these three great intellects there is something peculiarly 
touching. Talcott died suddenly at the early age of forty-five, leaving the mem- 
bers of the New York bar as sincere mourners. Butler, after the highest and 
purest living, died at fifty-nine [a mistake — it should be sixty-two], just as he 
landed in France to visit the scenes of which he had read and dreamed. Marcy, 
at sixty-two, having recently retired as President Pierce's Secretary of State, was 
found lifeless, lying upon his bed, book in hand. He had been reading, as he 
had read since childhood, whenever there came a lull in the demand for his 
wisdom, his counsel, and his friendship." 

38 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

This high gift and faculty of attracting to himself, by 
strong ties of friendship, able and upright men has been 
well cited by one of his biographers 1 as a proof of the in- 
trinsic worth of Mr. Van Buren's character. 

To those persons who imagine that the possession 
of place and power is the chief aim of men who, by 
nature and association, are inclined to active participation 
in public affairs, I would commend the following letter of 
Mr. Van Buren to my father. It is a striking illustra- 
tion of true and unselfish friendship, written at a moment 
when Mr. Van Buren was himself the subject of coarse 
ridicule and vituperation on the part of his political op- 
ponents, based on incessant charges of the selfish and 
sinister motives which men who envied him his success 
and plotted for his overthrow never wearied of imputing 
to him. It bears date Washington, November 8, 1833, 
and is as follows: 

My Dear Sir: 

I bespeak for the proposition I am about to make 
yours and Mrs. Butler's most deliberate consideration, 
before you conclude to reject it. I say Mrs. B.'s, be- 
cause in whatever relates so essentially to your future 
welfare, she ought of right to be consulted; and she has 
on a former occasion shown herself so much wiser than 
we were, that it would be a positive injustice, to refuse 
to take her into counsel now. 

The appointment of Mr. Daniel to the office of At- 
torney Genl. was published, by mistake, before his posi- 
tive acceptance had been ascertained. He has been 
with us, and after a full and frank conversation with the 
President, has decided not to accept it. With the reasons 

Edward M. Shepard, "Martin Van Buren" (1899). 

39 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

for that decision, which he came to with the greatest 
pain and reluctance, it is unnecessary, now, to trouble 
you. Mr. Daniel is a gentleman of the very highest 
character, and very respectable talents, but does not enter- 
tain that confidence in them which his friends think 
would be justifiable and there were urgent family and 
personal obstacles. The President thought, as I in- 
formed you, that he ought to go South for this appoint- 
ment, and having in good faith done so, he will now re- 
gard the accidental circumstance of the publication of 
Mr. Daniel's appointment a fortunate incident, if it shall, 
as he hopes, enable him to bring into his cabinet, one, 
whom every member of it would be delighted to see here, 
and that is yourself. Before this had occurred, I would 
not myself have proposed it to you, had the matter been 
at my disposal. Now, I think it free from difficulty or 
objection. The President will with the greatest pleasure 
confer the appointment upon you, and I am as solicitous 
as I could possibly be upon any subject that you shall 
accept it. Independent of the public considerations 
which are amply sufficient to justify this solicitude, I 
feel that if not indispensable, (though extremely impor- 
tant), for the present, it is, in reference to a possible fut- 
ure, most fitting as it respects myself that you should 
be here in some such a situation. Not one word is nec- 
essary, I know, to satisfy you that I would not press my 
personal solicitude upon you, as I for the first time freely 
do, if I were not entirely satisfied, that what I ask of you 
will promote your own interests, and those of your family; 
or at the least that it will certainly not prejudice them. I 
think so in respect to all the points which, in such a case, 
arise for consideration, and I will briefly assign my rea- 
sons. Although, you will recollect, I readily concurred 
in your objection to taking the place of Senator, I have 
ever since been impressed with the belief that it was a 
sacrifice, which you might with propriety have made. I 
gave in to your views, partly because I feared that from 
your gentlemanly and pacific disposition, (although not 
wanting in spirit when its exhibition is necessary,) the 

40 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

rough and tumble of the Senate might not please you; 
but principally, because I was apprehensive that it might 
affect the interests of your family in a pecuniary point of 
view. That now presented steers entirely clear of these 
objections, and has advantages which ought not to be 
lightly overlooked. 

Although you are not the slave of mad ambition, you 
are, as you ought to be, tenacious of your professional 
standing. That cannot be increased at home, and can 
only be made national, by becoming identified with na- 
tional concerns. Depend upon it, my dear sir, that this 
is so. The fact presses itself upon my observation almost 
daily, when I find how little is known, or cared, abroad, 
about you who are at the very top of the ladder at home. 
Mr. Wirt, Mr. Webster, Mr. Pinckney and Mr. Taney, 
although possessing the same talents, would not have 
gone beyond a passing observation, out of their own 
States, if they had not entered upon the national theatre. 
You recollect to have merely heard of Mr. Taney, whilst 
at the Washington Bar; now, although the same man, he 
is known and respected as a man of talents throughout 
the Union. The reason why it is so, it is unnecessary 
to go into; the fact is sufficient, and undeniable, that 
the great body of the people, will only look for the great 
men of the Nation, amongst those who are actually en- 
gaged in its service. Although you are too wise to be 
craving for a distinction of this sort, you are at the same 
time too wise to be indifferent to it. Providence has 
cut you out for its acquisition in this very place, and 
you have no right to turn back upon the occasion, which 
presents it to you, in so honorable, and entirely unexcep- 
tionable a manner. In a pecuniary point of view, it 
cannot, I deliberately think, be otherwise than beneficial. 
The salary is $4500, besides office, messenger, clerks, &c, 
and occasional compensation from the Government for 
services which do not necessarily appertain to the office. 
You can enter upon the business of the Supreme Court 
of the U. S. with advantages, which, if not immediately 
equal to those of Webster, (who makes his thousands 

4i 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

not to say tens of thousands by it), they very soon would 
be; and the President says it will be competent for you, 
without prejudice to the public interest, to attend the 
higher Courts at N. York and Albany. All previous 
Atty. Genls. who desired it have done so in respect to their 
own States. To the former place you will next season 
be able to go in 15 hours, and to the latter in a day and 
a night. What then is there to prevent you from in- 
creasing your provision for your children which I admit 
to be obligatory on you ? Nothing, that I can see. You 
can live as cheap here as in N. York. Your manner of 
living can be regulated by your own taste, and as every- 
body knows that you are not a man of pleasure, or parade, 
nobody will gossip about you. By taking this course 
you will accomplish what you are all so anxious about, 
viz., that you can be more with your family than hereto- 
fore. The only exception need be, your visits to N. 
York, during the sittings of the Courts, when you can 
take your family with you, without stopping between 
this and N. Y. — especially, when the railroad, the mak- 
ing of which is now under full operation, is completed. 

I recollect when the subject was before contingently 
discussed, and when you concluded that you could not 
take it, — that Mrs. Butler did not like the idea of bring- 
ing her daughters up here. Upon reflection, I think she 
will find that objection not so well founded as she then 
supposed. Mr. McLean, Mr. Taney, Mr. Woodbury and 
Gov. Cass, have each a houseful of little girls of the very 
finest character, and I am quite sure that the society for 
Mrs. B. and the children would be at least as good here, 
as in N. York; and if she cannot possibly do without hear- 
ing something more upon the subject of temperance she can 
count upon Gov. Cass as a never failing source. He has 
as much of the true spirit in him as Norton and Delavan 
combined, and Mr. Van Vechten and Courtland Van 
Rensselaer to boot. But to return from this digression, 
you must come. I tell you frankly that I have made up 
my mind so decidedly, that it is best for the public, for 
you and yours, for myself, and that you will prove so 

42 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

useful and acceptable to the President, that I cannot think 
of a declination with composure. As you were willing 
in the exuberance of friendship to come with me in 1829, 
as Under Secretary, and give up the finest professional 
prospects man ever had, I shall think you must have 
undergone some strange metamorphosis, if you now re- 
fuse to come into the Cabinet with those professional 
prospects enhanced, instead of abandoned. This must 
in the first instance be strictly confined to Mr. and Mrs. 
Flagg, Croswell, Dix, and John, 1 with whom I wish you 
to advise. If contrary to my earnest hope you determine 
to decline not a word must be said upon the subject. If 
you act the wiser part, you may, as is usual in such cases, 
consult with your friends generally, after your mind is 
made up. I have not included the Gov., 2 because he is I 
suppose busy with his message, but you may speak to him 
of course if you wish it. Tell Mrs. B. I shall never for- 
give her if she throws any obstacles in the way. I intend 
to be in N. York on Wednesday of next week, and hope 
you will meet me there. 

It will, in case of acceptance be necessary that you 
should come down immediately, for a day or two only 
to sign some patents which are waiting the Atty. GenTs 
signature, and there is no authority to appoint an acting 
Atty. After that, you may return, and make your ar- 
rangements for the winter. If you conclude as you ought 
to do, I wish you would write at once to the President 
as he is very anxious to have the matter closed. 

Remember me very kindly to Mrs. B. and the chil- 
dren, and believe me, 

Very truly yours, 

M. Van Buren. 

To B. F. Butler, Esq. 

P. S. — The President has read this letter and ap- 
proves it. He does not write you himself because I have 
told him that that is not necessary at this time. 

M. V. B. 

1 Probably John Van Buren, son of President Van Buren.— Ed. 

2 William Learned Marcy.— Ed. 

43 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

The appeal thus made could not be withstood, and a 
letter was written to President Jackson, accepting the 
office of attorney-general, on the duties of which the new 
incumbent immediately entered. 

The hold which my father had upon the community 
in which his lot had been cast, is shown by a letter written 
to him on his leaving Albany. It is dated November 26, 
1833, and bears eighty-nine signatures, the names includ- 
ing many of the most eminent citizens of the State, familiar 
in its history as statesmen, judges, lawyers, divines, physi- 
cians, and men of note in various walks, and testifies to 
their estimate of his worth, their personal friendship, and 
their regret at losing him from their social circles and 
from active co-operation in the interests of the city. 

[A number of letters still extant written chiefly by my 
father's parents during the eighteen months previous to 
their removal to Washington are of peculiar interest 
from both a public and personal aspect. 

The references to political events evidence my grand- 
father's keen grasp or public questions, his friendly and 
professional relations with Mr. Van Buren, and his own 
keen legal acumen. But one is impressed not only with 
the strong intellectuality of the writer, but with his intense 
modesty, even humility, evidently the result of a deeply 
religious nature. The tender heart which suffers at the 
frequent separations from his beloved wife and dear 
children — separations necessitated by the many demands 
upon his professional services and the lack of travelling 
facilities — pours itself out in exquisite expressions of 
loving devotion and holy thought. 

Life as it appears from these letters is very earnest, 
very serious, and every event must be sanctified; to all of 
which his wife responds with an added sense of delightful 

44 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

humor, which, lacking in her husband, was perhaps one 
of her unceasing charms for him in their peculiarly happy 
married life. It is quite as evident from whom my father 
derived his profoundly spiritual reflectiveness as it is from 
whom he inherited his keen wit. — Ed.] 



45 



CHAPTER IV 

JOURNEY TO WASHINGTON — ROBERTS VAUX — STORY OF FRANKLIN'S SAW- 
DUST PUDDING — THE SUPREME COURT — THE ROOM — THE JUDGES — 
WILLIAM WIRT — ANECDOTES — CALL ON GENERAL JACKSON — HIS AP- 
PEARANCE — WASHINGTON IN 1834 — SOCIAL LIFE— TONE OF SOCIETY — 
EFFECT OF SLAVERY — MEMBERS OF CONGRESS — THE " SWALLOW- 
TAILED GENTRY" — FOREIGN MINISTRY — SCHOOL LIFE IN WASHINGTON — 
SCHOOL LIFE IN HUDSON — LAFAYETTE'S WIG. 

OUR journey from New York required three days of 
travel. From New York to Philadelphia we came 
by the Camden and Amboy route, partly by rail and 
partly by water. In Philadelphia we stopped at Head's 
Hotel, a noted public house of the time, which has long 
since disappeared, and where, I remember, the proprietor 
took special pains for our comfort. A very pleasant 
evening spent at the home of Roberts Vaux, one of the 
worthiest of Friends and a foremost citizen of Philadelphia, 
remains with me as a delightful memory of our short stay 
in the City of Brotherly Love. 1 

1 Amongst my grandfather's papers I find the following interesting account, 
written by Roberts Vaux at the request of Martin Van Buren, of the "saw-dust 
pudding supper" given by Benjamin Franklin, which substantiates a story but 
little known. — Ed. 

My Dear Friend: 

In compliance with thy request I have written out the story of the saw-dust 
pudding supper given by Dr. Franklin to some of his friends about a century ago. 
Believe me always thy faithful and affectionate friend, Roberts Vaux. 

Saratoga Springs, 8mo. 15, 1835. 

To M. Van Buren, Vice President, U. S. 

Soon after Franklin made his first visit to Philadelphia in 1723, he became 
acquainted with my grandfather. The foundation of a mutual confidence and 

46 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Another day's travel brought us to Baltimore, where 
Mr. Barnum, the proprietor of the hotel which made his 
name famous, also did his best in entertaining our party. 
That was a memorable evening when the stage-coach 
containing my father and mother and the five children 
pulled up with customary clatter and clang in front of 
Fuller's Hotel in Washington, then standing at the corner 
of Pennsylvania Avenue and Fourteenth Street, the site 
for many years occupied by Willard's old hotel and which 
has now been replaced by the "New Willard." The 
journey from Baltimore, now accomplished in less than 

friendship was then laid, which endured through almost two-thirds of a century 
when death dissolved this long, and sincere attachment. They were born in the 
same year 1706, and so were several other members of the Junto which they 
formed in 1727 for the improvement of its associates in moral philosophy and 
political science. At that time there was but one newspaper in the Province, 
and Franklin's sagacious mind saw the need of another journal, to rectify pub- 
lic opinion, and disseminate principles, which he deemed essential to the general 
welfare. It was not however until 1736, that he succeeded in establishing his 
afterward far famed Pennsylvania Gazette, which distributed so much political 
and economical wisdom, to the People. — A printer himself by profession, but 
without funds, he was under the necessity of borrowing from two, or three of his 
friends, money to enable him to commence his labours. — He now rented a room 
in an obscure alley, where he opened his office and unassisted, composed, struck, 
off, and distributed his paper. — The acute and youthful champion of human 
rights, soon began to notice with great freedom and force, some of the men and 
measures of the day, which no one before had the moral courage to arraign. 
This exhibition, produced a concussion in the primitive community, not less 
startling, than the shocks which were afterward imparted by his original experi- 
ments with the electric fluid. — My Grandfather, and Philip Sing, and Luke Mor- 
ris and some other members of the Junto, who felt a deep interest in Franklin's suc- 
cess, hearing many complaints of the tone of his paragraphs, met one day to 
consider the propriety of advising him to be more moderate in that respect. — 
The consultation resulted in the appointment of two of them to administer a 
caution. — They found the editor with his sleeves rolled up, busy at his press, and 
on mentioning the purpose of their visit, he excused himself from want of time 
then, to hear them, but named an early evening when they and their constituents 
should take supper with him, and talk over the matter at leisure. On the ap- 
pointed night they assembled at his house, and some time was spent in communi- 

47 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

an hour, had consumed the entire day. At Washington 
the arrival of a member of the cabinet was an event 
stimulating Mr. Fuller and his whole staff to give us a 
warm welcome and make us at home in what to us were 
very novel surroundings. Two or three houses, originally 
built for private residences, fronting on Pennsylvania 
Avenue, had been annexed to the main hotel, and in one 
of these we lived during our first winter in Washington. 

It seemed a long walk from Fuller's to the Capitol, 
whither my father took me with him very soon after we 
had become settled in our quarters. He led me into the 

eating their opinions and views.— At length Franklin's wife made her appearance 
—she set out a table — covered it with a coarse tow cloth— placed a trencher and 
spoon and a penny porringer for each guest, and having deposited on one end 
of the simple board a large pudding, and on the other a stone pitcher, she re- 
tired.— The Philosopher now begged his friends to be seated.— To each he 
served a slice, and gave some water, and bid them enjoy themselves. — He sup- 
plied himself largely, and eat heartily; occasionally saying, "Come gentlemen 
help yourselves, we have another pudding in the pot." But in vain they endeavored 
to dispose of their fare.— Finally they looked at one another, and toward their 
host, and were about to withdraw from the table; at this moment Franklin rose 
and said. "/ am happy to have your company and to listen to your suggestions 
— some of you have been my benefactors especially — your advice is well meant I 
know, but I cannot think with you in some respects. You see upon what humble 
food I can live, and he who can subsist upon Saw Dust Pudding 1 and Water, as can 
Benjamin Franklin, Printer, needs not the Patronage 0} any one." Hereupon 
they parted, cordially shaking hands; the advisers resolving as they walked home, 
never more to interfere with the intrepid editor.— Roberts Vaux. 

Saratoga Springs, 8mo. 15, 1835. 

The substance of the foregoing anecdote, was related at a meeting of the 
Contributors of the Penna. Institution for the instruction of the Blind, just be- 
fore that body went into an election for its officers, when the narrator was left 
out of the station of Vice President, solely on account of his political opinions, 
having shared a similar fate in almost all the benevolent and literary associations 
of his native City during the reign 0} terror created by the advocates of the Bank 
of the U. S.- R - V - 

> See " The Beginner's American History," by Montgomery, p. 86. " That kind of mush was then 
eaten only by very poor people; and because it was yellow and coarse, it was nicknamed sawdust 
pudding.' " — Ed. 

48 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Supreme Court Room, which was then in the basement 
of the north wing of the Capitol, the space now occupied 
by the Law Library. In the vestibule of this basement 
are certain marble pillars of grace and beauty, not now 
often noticed by visitors to the Capitol, who seldom enter 
at this point. Each column ' consists of two rows of corn- 
stalks, one surmounting the other, the full-grown ears 
in the open corn-leaves forming the capitals. This is an 
adaptation of the classical Corinthian order, which, from 
an artistic point of view, may seem barbaric, but the 
effect of which, to my eye, has always been most pleas- 
ing, and to my mind most appropriate in associating the 
highest form of ancient art with a common product of 
our western continent. These columns flank the plat- 
form from which rises the marble circular staircase which, 
in 1833, and until wings were added to the Capitol, led 
to the Senate Chamber. This room is now occupied by 
the Supreme Court, which until i860 was most inade- 
quately housed in the basement, underneath the Senate — 
an arrangement wholly unjustifiable, unless, perhaps, by 
the idea that Justice should underlie Legislation. 

On my first visit to the court my boyish attention was 
fastened upon the seven judges as they entered the room 
— seven being the number then composing the court. It 
was a procession of old men — for so they seemed to me 
— who halted on their way to the bench, each of them 
taking from a peg hanging on the side of the wall near the 

1 These columns are said to have been designed by Thomas Jefferson, with a 
special idea of Americanizing Greek art. — En. 

49 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

entrance a black robe and donning it in full view of the 
assembled lawyers and other spectators. This some- 
what extra-judicial act impressed me more than any sub- 
sequent proceeding of the court, and left a vivid picture 
in my memory. Long afterward, when I went to Wash- 
ington to argue cases before the highest tribunal, con- 
trasting the dignified formalities which attended the 
opening of the court at every session with the robing 
method which I have described, I began to think I must 
have been mistaken, and that I could not have seen Chief- 
Justice Marshall, Judge Story, and their associates 1 do- 
ing so informal a thing as putting on their robes after 
entering the court-room. One day after the adjourn- 
ment of the court, Chief- Justice Taney stopped, as was 
oftentimes his habit, to exchange a word with me, and I 
seized the opportunity to ask him whether my recollec- 
tion in this matter of the robing of the justices was correct 
or at fault. He said at once that I was quite right in my 
remembrance, and that until the court was moved upstairs, 
the judges always put on their robes in the court-room. 

In the first part of his residence in Washington, my 
father was often accompanied in his walks to the court by 
William Wirt, one of the most conspicuous men of the time, 
who was living temporarily in Washington, in lodgings only 
a few doors from our hotel. I sometimes walked with 
them and listened to the talk by the way. Mr. Wirt had 
been a predecessor of my father in the office of attorney- 

1 The Supreme Court bench at that time consisted of Chief- Justice John Mar- 
shall and Associate Justices William Johnson. Gabriel Duvall, Joseph Story, 
Smith Thompson, John McLean, and Henry Baldwin.— Ed. 

5° 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

general, having been appointed by President Monroe in 
1 817 to succeed Richard Rush, who resigned to become 
minister to England. Mr. Wirt's term of service had been 
longer than that of any other incumbent of the office, and 
lasted until 1829, when he retired on General Jackson's 
accession to the Presidency. 

A warm friendship existed between my father and 
Mr. Wirt. Their tastes and professional views were sin- 
gularly alike. They were both Presbyterians, while they 
were widely apart in politics. Mr. Wirt had attained 
celebrity as an author, his "British Spy" and "Life of 
Patrick Henry" being American classics; while that part 
of his famous speech at the trial of Aaron Burr, with its 
descriptive episode of his home on the banks of the Ohio, 
beginning "Who is Blennerhasset ?' 3 rivaled, in the suf- 
frages of school-boys, Mark Antony's eulogy of Caesar 
and even Halleck's "Marco Bozzaris." He was brilliant 
and able as a lawyer, but somewhat erratic in his political 
views and associations. In 1832 he allowed his name 
to be used to lead a forlorn hope by accepting a nomi- 
nation for the Presidency from a National Convention of 
the so-called "Anti-Masonic" Party. This political or- 
ganization originated in the State of New York, and had 
sufficient strength to enlist supporters in many States; 
but so few were they in each locality that of the 286 elec- 
toral votes Mr. Wirt received only the seven which were 
cast by the State of Vermont. 

In the early part of February, 1834, Mr. W 7 irt was 
taken ill, and it was made my duty to go every morning 

5 1 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

to enquire as to his condition and report it at home. He 
rapidly grew worse and when I called on the iSth, he 
was near his end. He died at eleven o'clock that morning. 

On a table in the drawing-room of my father's house 
in New York City, after we had removed from Washing- 
ton, there stood a little box made of wood taken from the 
famous "Charter Oak" at Hartford, Conn. It enclosed, 
as a memento of William Wirt, a carefully folded paper 
containing a lock of his silver-white hair, a kind of souve- 
nir more in vogue sixty years ago than to-day. At an 
evening reception, standing by this table in company with a 
young ladv of great intelligence and education, a daughter 
of one of the most eminent clergymen in New York, I called 
her attention to the box, and after opening it I said: 
"This paper contains a lock of hair of William Wirt." 
She gave it a glance and then said: "And who was Wil- 
liam Wirt ? " Being a very young man, I was amazed and 
almost stupefied at such an exhibition of what seemed to 
me inexcusable ignorance; but the incident, casual as it 
was, taught me a lesson. I have never forgotten the 
emptiness of professional repute and even of literary or 
political fame. Here was a man at the head of his pro- 
fession, of established literary reputation, and ot such 
political prominence as to have been a presidential candi- 
date, and yet an intelligent young woman, in the best 
society of the metropolis of the nation, was ignorant ot 
even his name. 

More interesting perhaps than my view of the Supreme 
Court was the first visit I paid, in company with my 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

father, to General Jackson at the White House. He re- 
ceived us in the large room on the second floor of the Ex- 
ecutive Mansion at the northwest end, which was his cus- 
tomary abiding-place while president, and where his 
wife's Bible on the square table by which he was accus- 
tomed to sit and her portrait near the foot of his bed, 
were constantly in view. His name had been a house- 
hold word to me from my earliest years, made especially 
familiar by the picturesque sobriquet of "Old Hickory." 
He was at this time at the very height of his popularity, 
having received 219 out of the 286 electoral votes cast in 
the presidential election of 1832, the popular vote having 
been 707,217 in his favor as against 583,281 for all his 
rivals in the candidacy. 1 Although hardly sixty-seven 
years old (having been born March 15, 1767), he seemed 
to me a very old man; and his gaunt and somewhat grim 
features told the story of exposure, frontier perils and the 
strife of arms, as well as of his many personal and politi- 
cal conflicts. His bristling hair rising from his fore- 
head, his long face seamed with wrinkles, and the aspect 
of command and dominating will which were his promi- 
nent characteristics, made him a most impressive figure 
in my eyes. His manner was then, as it always was in 
social intercourse, most courteous and kind; to women 
and children he never was otherwise. The true Jackson, 
as I saw him then and afterward, was wholly unlike the 
Jackson of the Whig newspapers and caricaturists. My 
early recollections of him are less vivid than those of ten 

'William G. Sumner, "Andrew Jackson" (1899), p. 321. 

53 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

years later, when I saw him more intimately during a 
visit to the "Hermitage," in the spring of 1844, which I 
will chronicle in due course. But this first interview 
took a strong hold upon my memory and gratified my 
youthful longing to see, face to face, the hero of New 
Orleans. General Jackson's private secretary was his 
nephew, Major Andrew Donelson, whose wife presided 
over the household of the Executive Mansion. She was 
a beautiful woman and deservedly popular in Washing- 
ton. 

At that time Washington was a typical Southern city. 
Slavery existed in the District of Columbia, and Alex- 
andria, a few miles distant from Washington, was an 
established slave-mart. No political party in 1834 dared 
to raise a protest against the existence and domination of 
the slave power in the District, although John Quincy 
Adams, who had taken his seat in Congress in December 
1 83 1, had signalized his entrance into that body, where 
he was to become for the next succeeding fifteen years 
the champion of the anti-slavery cause, by presenting 
"fifteen petitions signed numerously by citizens of Penn- 
sylvania praying for the abolition of slavery and the slave 
trade in the District of Columbia." Even he* however, 
staunch advocate of liberty as he was, stated while moving 
the reference of these petitions to the Committee on the 
District of Columbia, that he should not support that part 
of the petition which prayed for the abolition in the District. 

Slavery as a moral evil, especially when viewed in 
the clearer light which, in the fulness of time, dawned 

54 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

upon our national horizon, was just as much a crime 
against humanity in 1834 as it was at the date of the Proc- 
lamation of Emancipation nearly thirty years later. 
But as a factor in the social life of the national capital, it 
seemed in 1834, in the general view, not only harmless 
but beneficial. Leading members and officers of the ad- 
ministration, senators and representatives in Congress, 
came from the Southern States bringing their household 
slaves with them, while those from the North were forced 
to hire for domestic service slaves belonging to residents 
of the District of Columbia, whose wages went to their 
masters. The South felt as secure in respect to its rights 
of property in slaves in the District of Columbia as in 
the Southern States. The North acquiesced, and the bi- 
ographer of Mr. Adams says in reference to the petitions 
which he presented, that "these first stones were dropped 
into the pool without stirring a ripple on the surface,'* 
and he adds that "for about four years more we hear 
little in the Diary concerning slavery." 

The prevailing tone of society in Washington was 
thus given by those of its members who represented the 
South and slavery. They brought with them the man- 
ners and customs of the Southern capitals and Southern 
plantation life. The open-handed hospitality of the 
Southern planter, whose servants were born in his house 
and swarmed about the guests who visited him from the 
North, intent on all the ministrations of service, secured 
for him an ascendency. Officers of the government and 
members of Congress who came from the North with 

55 









WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

their wives and families, could not enter into competition 
in the rivalries of social life with men and women hav- 
ing at command such special resources. The Northern 
woman accustomed to doing the whole or a very large 
share of her own housekeeping, and hampered by the 
lack of adequate domestic service, had never enjoyed 
sufficient leisure from domestic cares to engage in that 
special cultivation of her mind which would fit her for 
insight into political affairs or enable her to use her social 
position as a means for advancing political interests. She 
was thus at a disadvantage as compared with her South- 
ern sisters, and in proportion to her good sense was more 
than willing to yield to them the kind of precedence which 
they coveted and enjoyed. Nevertheless, I think the 
Northern woman somewhat resented the praises lavished 
upon the Southern slave-holders for their hospitality, 
claiming, as well she might, that an equal degree of that 
grace would be exhibited in New England and New York 
if their households could be furnished with an indefinite 
number of domestics working without wage and having a 
marketable value. 

A prominent reason for the familiarity with public 
affairs which distinguished Southern women at Washing- 
ton was the fact that with the whole slave-holding popula- 
tion of the South the question of their ancestral institu- 
tion was largely one of property and of their continuing 
title to it. Every member of a family owning slaves by 
inheritance or other modes of acquisition early came to 
know that slavery had in this country become peculiar to 

56 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

the South, as it had gradually disappeared from the 
North, and was confined to the States lying below what 
was called "Mason and Dixon's Line," and that while it 
was protected by supposed constitutional guarantees 
there was an element of uncertainty in the tenure by which 
it was held. Hence they were constantly on the alert 
to any word or act in any part of the country or in the 
private circles in which they moved, inimical to this right 
of property. The Southern ear was quick to catch and 
the Southern voice to resent the least sound which carried 
with it disapproval of slavery as a domestic institution in 
the States where it existed by law. 

Thus it came about that while in the North the ques- 
tion of slavery interested, in the main, philanthropists and 
liberty-loving agitators, and did not at all enter into the 
pursuits of life, or the various means of earning money 
and acquiring property, in the South it created a com- 
munity thoroughly compact and cemented together by 
the strong bond of common defense for the protection of 
property rights against what was considered lawless in- 
vasion. When slavery brought forth secession and re- 
bellion, the Southern women, old and young, knew as 
well as the men that the failure of their cause meant 
the destruction of their property, which was to them 
their life. 

In 1834 Washington seemed like a scattering village 
with a few large buildings breaking the monotony. The 
population, even when swelled during the sessions of 
Congress by an influx of senators and representatives, 

57 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

and of the constituents who formed the lobbies of that 
day, was very small as compared with that of the present 
time. There were few railroads to aid the traveller who 
set out from any part of the country to reach the national 
capital. Of senators there were only forty-eight; of rep- 
resentatives two hundred and forty, while the perma- 
nent officers in the several departments were a handful as 
compared with those who to-day fill the vast buildings 
now replacing the modest brick structures which in 1834 
stood on the four corners of the grounds adjoining the 
White House, and which were then deemed all-sufficient 
for the State, Treasury, War and Navy Departments. 

The Washington of to-day, 1 with its smooth asphalt 
streets, its grand public buildings, its parks and statues 
and its fine private residences, gives little idea of the 
Washington of 1834, except as to space, being still what 
John Randolph called it, "a city of magnificent distances." 

I have found in a recent life of Hannibal Hamlin 2 such 
a graphic description of the city, and of Congressional 
life and manners at a not much later date than that of 
my first acquaintance with it, that I am tempted to quote 
it here: 

"Washington was not an inspiring spectacle. ... It 
was a small, straggling, overgrown, and ill-kept city of 
twenty thousand inhabitants. The streets were full of 
grass and dirt. Cows were even pastured in some of the 
principal streets. The houses were cheerless-looking. 
Pennsylvania Avenue was paved with dust or mud, ac- 
cording to the weather that prevailed. On a windy 

1 1899. 

1 Charles E. Hamlin, "The Life and Times of Hannibal Hamlin" (1899). 

58 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

day immense clouds of dust swept over the street, some- 
times making it hard for pedestrians to see their way. 
On a rainy day the avenue was a bank of thick, black 
mud. One of the few picturesque sights was the old 
Capitol. The Washington of that period was a disgrace. 
Few Congressmen brought their families to live with 
them, and it was the custom for them to club together, 
hire a house, and contract with the landlord or a caterer 
to provide the table. These clubs were called 'messes,' 
and they were more important and exclusive than the 
name would seem to imply. Many famous measures 
were planned at 'messes,' and their champions appointed. 
It was the invariable rule that no member of a 'mess' 
should invite an outsider to dinner without having ob- 
tained the permission of his associates. Strange to say 
refusal rarely gave offence. 

"Congress was a more demonstrative and talkative 
body than the one which now assembles at Washing- 
ton. Many members wore the old-fashioned swallow- 
tailed coat, and others the buff waistcoat. Mr. Hamlin 
adopted the former garment and wore it all the rest of 
his life. Although there was not that brilliant social at- 
mosphere of to-day, yet in their polite intercourse the 
members of Congress were very ceremonious. The 
speeches were ornate, full of high-sounding periods, and, 
as a rule, very long. It was the closing period of a pict- 
uresque era — one full of extravagant talk and demon- 
stration that preluded an approach of a time of violent 
action. There were still orators in Congress who regu- 
larly announced in their speeches their willingness to shed 
their blood on their country's altar, simply to gratify a 
weak fondness for playing on their own emotions. Per- 
sonal habits were not as good as now. There was much 
drinking and card-playing. Public altercations were not 
infrequent. Personal allusions in debate were frequent. 
Duelling was still practised. Party feeling, too, was in- 
tense, and party discipline was rigid. There could not 
be much intercourse between the people of the various 
parts of the country, on account of the scant and ex- 

59 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

pensive facilities of travel. Hence, provincialism and 
partisanship of a narrow kind were to a considerable ex- 
tent the outcome of the order of things." 

The swallow-tailed gentry, referred to in the above 
abstract, were very familiar figures in that part of my 
boyhood which was spent in Washington. They were 
conspicuous in the Capitol, on Pennsylvania Avenue, and 
in all circles of society. The lines of official and social 
etiquette were quite strictly drawn. The circle of soci- 
ety, enclosed in a narrower sphere, was not liable to un- 
authorized intrusions. The afternoon tea, which now 
serves as a kind of smokeless powder in official houses to 
disperse a large army of visitors without leaving any 
resultant unpleasant vapors, had not then been invented. 
Evening receptions, sometimes entirely conversational, 
sometimes expanded into dancing parties, were custom- 
ary forms of entertainment outside of the conventional 
levees at the White House. At the evening receptions 
refreshments on a moderate scale were given, and I well 
remember a confectioner in Pennsylvania Avenue named 
"Kindiy" who enjoyed a monopoly in furnishing ices 
and other products of his skill in Washington, almost 
equalling that which was enjoyed in New York by "Con- 
toit," whose ice-cream was the standard of perfection 
until superseded by what we were accustomed to call 
" Philadelphia ice-cream." 

The leading foreign ministers accredited to our gov- 
ernment during General Jackson's administration were 
great favorites in the social life of the capital. Mr. 

60 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Fox, the British Minister, a relative of Charles James 
Fox, the famous parliamentary leader and orator, was 
a man of ability, but also of some eccentricities. His 
preference for waiting before going in to dinner until 
the dishes were well cooled off, furnished a topic of 
gossip in Washington. Baron Von Roenne, who repre- 
sented the kingdom of Prussia, was one of the most ac- 
complished of jurists and publicists. A devoted friend- 
ship sprang up between him and my father. He was 
very highly esteemed in his own country, both in public 
and private life. I enjoyed his hospitality in Berlin in 
1847. These foreign ministers were able to make a con- 
siderable display in the way of equipages and appoint- 
ments, household and otherwise, the Russian Minister 
especially being credited with great possessions and vast 
wealth. 

Our winters in Washington, up to and including 1837, 
were spent in various places of abode in different parts 
of the city. At one time we lived on the east side of 
President's (now Lafayette) Square, in a large brick house 
which was then managed as a boarding-house by a Mrs. 
Latimer. It was afterward occupied by Secretary Sew- 
ard, and in it he narrowly escaped death at the hand 
of an assassin in April, 1865, on the night of the shooting 
of President Lincoln. 1 Later my father hired a house 
in the western part of the city toward the Potomac, a 
very pleasant residence. 

1 The house has long since been torn down and the Lafayette Opera House, 
now the Belasco Theater, was erected on its site. — Ed. 

6l 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

My schooling was at Georgetown, first in a school 
kept by a master named Hill, and afterward in another 
of which James McVean was the head. 

Mr. McVean was a most accomplished teacher of 
Latin and Greek, and inspired me with a taste for the 
latter language, for which I have always been grateful to 
him. Although my regular readings in the Odyssey con- 
tinued for some time after I graduated from college, they 
were at last superseded by other and more pressing occu- 
pations. I thus inevitably fell out of the rank of men 
who could read Greek after leaving college, and whom I 
once heard Emerson say in a lecture he could count on 
his fingers. 

Between these two scholastic experiences and during 
a part of my father's term of office I was at school in 
Hudson, N. Y., under the Rev. Cyrus Huntington, hav- 
ing the advantage of being near my mother's elder sis- 
ter, Lydia, to whom I was much attached. She had 
married Nathan Chamberlin, of Hudson, and lived near 
the school at which I boarded. In the latter part of 
his life, Mr. Chamberlin became blind, but not until 
after he had built in Allen Street a well-planned and 
well-constructed house, through every part of which 
he was able to find his way, notwithstanding his want 
of sight. 

The only other sister of my mother, Mary Allen, born 
in 1800, married Robert J. Macy, a ship-master and the 
popular captain of one of the old line of Black Ball pack- 
ets sailing between New York and Liverpool. He and 

62 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

his wife were one of the handsomest couples to be met 
with anywhere, and, having spent some time in France, 
were proficient in their knowledge of the French language 
and manners. The story is told of my aunt Mary that 
on a visit which she paid to Lafayette, who was always 
exceedingly courteous to Americans, she said to him 
that she had a great favor to ask. He indicated that he 
would grant it; and she begged him for a lock of his 
hair. "Madame," said the general, "I wear a wig." 
But to show his willingness to meet her wishes he pro- 
posed to have the wig so far removed that if she could 
find any remaining natural hairs she was welcome to 
appropriate them to her own use. Accordingly a few 
clippings were secured which she took home, a great 
treasure, and divided with my mother, the quota of each 
sister being preserved in a ring. My uncle Robert's 
health failed and he died September 22, 1836, his widow 
surviving him until October 22, 1853. Neither of my 
aunts is represented by any descendants. The elder of 
them had no children, and the two sons of the younger 
died unmarried. One of these was the Rev. William 
Allen Macy, who went as a missionary to China and 
died there. 



[To his educational experience at Georgetown my father 
often referred. Under his first master, Silas Hill, he studied 
for four months. At the end of that period Mr. Hill wrote 
a letter interesting, not only for what it says of my father's 
youthful mental promise, but for the comparatively in- 
significant charges, made at that time, for education. 

63 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Dear Sir: Washington, May 19th, '34. 

By request, I have prepared Allen's Bill for Tuition 
etc., and as I have been unsuccessful in several attempts 
at an interview with yourself and Mrs. Butler, I take 
this opportunity to make a remark or two respecting him. 
His particular studies, and standing in his classes, you 
have seen in his weekly cards; and considering his age, 
that standing has been high, very high. As many studies 
have engaged his attention, and he has been urged for- 
ward in them as fast as appeared to us judicious. He 
has a mind of great vivacity and strength, and were I not 
addressing a Parent, I should predict much respecting 
his future course. Nor is this said through excess of 
partiality, or from a superficial acquaintance with the 
characteristics of his mind. As our number of Pupils is 
limited and two permanent Instructors are connected 
with the school, we make it our duty to weigh the minds 
committed to our charge, for the purpose of affording the 
best discipline. The performance of such a duty is the 
work of time, and we flatter ourselves, that were his con- 
tinuance with us greater, his progress would be even 
more creditable. Undoubtedly, however, he will be ex- 
ceedingly well situated in Albany for all purposes of in- 
tellectual and moral culture. I will only add that his 
deportment in general has been admirable. Should I 
again fail of the pleasure of an interview, Mr. and Mrs. 
Butler will accept the assurance of my respectful regards; 
and Allen, my kindest wishes for his happiness and use- 
fulness. Silas H. Hill. 

Hon. B. F. Butler to Silas H. Hill — Dr. 

To Tuition of Son from Jan'y 8th '34 to March 

30th — One Quarter $12.50 

Stationery & Character Cards 1.00 

Fuel 88 

2 Copy Books .26 

Latin Reader .50 

National Reader .75 

$15.89 

64 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

To Tuition, Stationery & Cards 

to May 21st, — 7^ weeks $8.45 

Fuel -34 

History of U. States -75 

Copy Book -13 

$25-56 
Washington City, May 19th, 1834. 

Received Payment 

Silas H. Hill. 

Rev. James McVean, to whom my father refers as in- 
spiring him with a love of the classics, was a Presbyterian 
minister, a graduate of Princeton College and at one time 
was elected to the chair of Greek at that college, but de- 
clined the offer. Mr. McVean taught school at George- 
town from 1822 to 1847, at which time the town of about 
8,000 inhabitants was quite an educational center. The 
Georgetown School, the Monastery, the Lancastrian 
School and the McVean School drew scholars from dif- 
ferent parts of the country especially from the South. My 
father's attendance at the Georgetown School necessitated 
exceptional physical as well as mental efforts on his part. 
This is not mentioned by him, but is evident from a letter 
written from Washington by one of his sisters during the 
winter of 1836, in which she says: 

"William goes to Georgetown to school every day; 
it is a long walk, but every one concurs in saying it will 
be of great benefit to him. He was to have gone as a 
boarder, but Mrs. McVean thought she could not receive 
him, saying that if he came she would be obliged to have 
an additional servant on his account. Will was quite 
amused at the idea of their requiring another servant on 
his account." 

From the school in Hudson, which my father attended 
for a few months in the winter of 1834-35, we find 
him, then in his eleventh year, writing encouragingly to 
his mother thus: "I wish you would give yourself no 
anxiety on my account, for I have everything that I wish 
and I am perfectly contented here and at present I see 

65 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

nothing to prevent me from being so all winter." He goes 
on to say that he feels "blocked off entirely " from his 
family, as the river is frozen over; he wonders what keeps 
his father so long at Washington, and mentions that he is 
in the seventh book of Caesar. 

In another letter we find the hours of his school life 
so scheduled that he thinks "they have a good deal of 
time in the evening to play" — an opinion with which the 
present generation of school-boys would hardly agree. 
"We get up at six o'clock, come directly to the school- 
room, and study an hour; then we have breakfast and 
from that time until half past eight o'clock we can do 
what we please. At half past eight we come into school 
and remain there until twelve; from that time until half 
past one we do what we have a mind to; then we go to 
school and stay till half past five and then we are at 
liberty until nine o'clock." In winter an extra hour of 
sleep is allowed in the morning, for then, he says, in a let- 
ter written the previous December, "We get up about 
seven o'clock and have fifteen minutes to dress, we wash 
in the kitchen and have breakfast at half past seven 
o'clock" — and in the afternoon, "we come out at four, 
we have tea at half past five and after prayers we study 
our lessons for the next day in the school-room an hour 
after which we go to bed or sit up and read just as we 
please." — Ed.] 



66 



CHAPTER V 

SLAVERY CONDITIONS AT NATIONAL CAPITAL — RESULTS OF COMPROMISES 
— HISTORICAL REVIEW OF INTRODUCTION OF SLAVERY INTO THE 
UNITED STATES — BIRTH AND GROWTH OF ABOLITION SENTIMENT — 
THE ORDINANCE OF 1 787 — COMPROMISES OF THE CONSTITUTION — 
RECOGNITION OF SLAVERY BY THE CONSTITUTION — FUGITIVE SLAVES 
— ABOLITION OF SLAVE-TRADE — LOUISIANA PURCHASE — MISSOURI 
COMPROMISE — LETTER OF JOHN FORSYTH TO VAN BUREN. 

"O ECURRING to the incidents of our residence in 
-■- ** Washington, and to the influence of slavery which 
marked its social and political conditions, it must be 
remembered that although there were as yet only faint 
indications of the storm which was destined to break upon 
the country in later years, slavery was thoroughly in- 
trenched at Washington and in the national councils. In 
fact, its ascendency was the direct result of the advan- 
tages secured by it from the Compromises. The United 
States was never responsible for the introduction of sla- 
very into the territories embraced within its borders. It 
had existed in the North American colonies as a part of 
the British colonial system. In the same year as that in 
which the Mayflower brought the Pilgrims to Plymouth 
Rock, namely, in August, 1619, twenty African slaves 
were landed from a Dutch ship at Jamestown, Va. 1 
From that time until the Declaration of Independence 

'Fiske, "Old Virginia and Her Neighbors," 1897 (1900), p. 179. 

67 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

and the outbreak of the American Revolution, slavery, 
under the fostering care of the British Government, in- 
creased in the various colonies, until, in 1776, there were 
in the country about 500,000 persons of African descent, 
of whom only a few were free. Slavery, with its accom- 
panying traffic in human beings, had been foisted upon 
the colonies and held them in its grasp, although efforts 
were made in some of the Northern and Eastern States 
for its suppression. Thus slavery was abolished in Ver- 
mont as early as 1777, and in Massachusetts in 1780. 
Pennsylvania in 1780 also passed an "Act of Gradual 
Abolition" by which the importation of slaves was pro- 
hibited and all persons born or brought into the State were 
made free. New Hampshire abolished slavery in 1784. 

An Abolition Society was formed in New York in 1785, 
of which John Jay was president and Alexander Hamilton 
secretary. Similar societies were formed in Rhode Island 
and Connecticut in 1789 and 1790, in New Jersey in 1792, 
and others were also organized in Delaware, Maryland, 
and Virginia. In the last-named State, however, in 1785, 
Washington wrote to Lafayette that "petitions for the 
abolition of slavery . . . could scarcely obtain a hearing." 1 

After the treaty of peace, by which the independence 
of the United States was acknowledged, had been signed 
at Paris, November 30, 1782, the conflicting claims of the 
different colonies to the vast territory acquired by their 
successful revolution against British rule were amicably 
adjusted. At the Continental Congress, which met at 

1 Henry Wilson, "Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in America," pp. 20-26. 

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A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Annapolis on March i, 1784, all lands northwest of the 
Ohio River, originally claimed by Virginia, were ceded to 
the United States. On July 13, 1787, Congress passed 
an act providing that in the territory northwest of the 
Ohio River there should be neither slavery nor involun- 
tary servitude. It contained, however, a stipulation for 
the return to their owners of fugitive slaves coming into 
the territory. This famous ordinance, which insured 
freedom in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wis- 
consin, was passed with only one vote in the negative. 
The Southern colonies, in which the slave-trade had in- 
creased and the slaves multiplied, succeeded in protecting 
the institution of slavery not only within their original 
boundaries, but also in the territory embraced in the new 
States as they existed when the Constitution was adopted. 
Repeated efforts were made to procure the suspension 
and avoid the effect of the Ordinance of 1787. But when 
the convention to form the Constitution of the United 
States met in Philadelphia in May, 1787, slavery had al- 
ready become an institution so interwoven with the social 
conditions of the Southern States, and property in those 
States had become so dependent upon slave labor, that 
the South presented a united front against any efforts on 
the part of the North to encroach upon its asserted rights. 
The people of the United States in their efforts to establish 
the Union under a Constitution which should preserve the 
rights of the several States and yet establish a supreme 
government exercising such powers as might be delegated 
to it by the several States, were thus confronted by a 

69 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

problem for whose conditions they were not responsible 
and with which it was almost impossible to deal. 

The Union could not be formed without the coopera- 
tion of the slave States, and as these States would not come 
into the Union without a sufficient guarantee for the recog- 
nition and protection of their property in slaves, there 
was only one alternative — to abandon the plan of union 
or make such concessions and compromises as would 
satisfy the South. Hence came what are called in our 
political history the "Compromises of the Constitution." 
They were directly in the teeth of the sweeping asser- 
tions of the Declaration of Independence upholding the 
doctrine that all men are created equal and are entitled 
to the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit 
of happiness; and on purely moral considerations the 
North might well have stood then on the ground which it 
was forced to take seventy-four years later. 

But at the time this was an impossibility. Even the 
most extreme emancipationists of a later date admit that 
the framers of the Constitution acted wisely. 

The word "slavery" does not occur in the Constitu- 
tion. I believe its exclusion was due to the objections of 
James Madison. The existence of slavery, however, in 
the slave-holding States and the rights conceded to these 
States in reference to it are recognized and guaranteed: 

First, by the provision that in the basis of representa- 
tion in Congress there should be included, in addition to 
the whole number of free persons, "three-fifths of all other 
persons." 

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A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Second, by the provision that "no person held to ser- 
vice or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping 
into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regula- 
tion therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but 
shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such 
service or labor may be due." 

Third, by the provision that "the migration or impor- 
tation of such persons as any of the States now existing 
shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by Con- 
gress prior to the year 1808." 

This meant, in plain English, that the slave-trade 
should not be abolished until the end of the seventh year 
of the nineteenth century. These provisions constituted 
the earliest compromises on the question of slavery. They 
were not adopted without much debate and many mis- 
givings on the part of Northern members of the con- 
vention. Gouverneur Morris, of New York, a deter- 
mined opponent of slavery, well stated the situation when 
he said, "I am reduced to the dilemma of doing injustice 
to the Southern States or to human nature. I must do 
it to the former: I can never agree to give such encour- 
agement to the slave-trade as would be given by allow- 
ing them the representation for their negroes." But the 
convention over which Washington presided and which 
included many of the ablest men who had taken part in 
the successful struggle for independence, not only adopted 
the Constitution with its concessions to the slave power, 
but was instrumental in procuring its ratification by the 
States. 

7i 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Thus the newly organized nation started on its course 
as one of the powers of the world with the burden of 
slavery as a social and political institution imposed upon 
it by the government from which it had wrested its inde- 
pendence. It was in the position of an heir upon whom 
a rich inheritance had devolved, encumbered by a mort- 
gage debt from which he could not redeem his estates 
and which he was powerless to discharge. The ink was 
scarcely dry on the parchment whereon the Constitution 
had been engrossed and signed, before the irrepressible 
conflict of slavery began. Outcry was raised in some 
quarters, pending the ratification of the Constitution by 
the States, against the compromises by which it dealt 
with the question of slavery, and within a year after the 
organization of the first Congress petitions began to pour 
in setting forth the evils of slavery and praying for con- 
gressional action for their abatement. 

The Quakers were the first memorialists. Their peti- 
tions were laid on the table; and from that time onward, 
while the right of petition was insisted upon in both 
Houses, no action was ever taken by Congress looking to 
any interference with the right of any slave-holding State 
to hold slaves as property within the limits of its territory. 
This was all the Constitution secured to the South, except 
the right to recapture runaway slaves found in the free 
States. The Constitution was silent as to any right or 
claim on the part of the Southern slave-holders to carry 
their slaves with them as property into newly acquired 
territory. The Ordinance of 1787 was an exercise of the 

72 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

powers of the Continental Congress to prohibit slavery 
north of the Ohio River, and there could be no question 
that a like right was vested in Congress by the Federal 
Constitution, one of its expressed powers being to admit 
new States into the Union and to make all needful rules 
and regulations respecting the territory belonging to the 
United States. 

In the South, while the compromises of the Consti- 
tution were acceptable, extreme jealousy existed with re- 
gard to new acquisitions of territory, and a public sen- 
timent there grew up demanding that the admission 
of new States should be so regulated as to secure the acces- 
sion of a slave State for every free State that might gain 
entrance to the Union. This was so far acquiesced in 
by the North that it took the form of a tacit agreement and 
was acted upon for many years. Thus Vermont in 1791 
and Kentucky in 1792, Tennessee in 1796 and Ohio in 
1802, Louisiana in 1812 and Indiana in 1816, Mississippi 
in 1 81 7 and Illinois in 181 8 were respectively admitted, 
each an offset to the other so far as the question of 
slavery was concerned. 

Southern opinion was also very sensitive on the subject 
of fugitive slaves. As early as 1795 a bill was introduced 
into the Senate, which passed both Houses with practical 
unanimity, giving effect to the constitutional provisions 
in aid of the recapture of runaways from their Southern 
masters; and while it called forth much indignation in 
the Northern States on the part of the friends of emancipa- 
tion, it remained unaltered for nearly sixty years, during 

73 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

which time repeated efforts were made by the South to 
add to its stringency. These were unsuccessful, how- 
ever, until the Act of 1850, the "Fugitive Slave Law," 
superseded the earlier and comparatively ineffectual 
legislation upon this subject. 

The abolition of the African slave-trade, which the 
Constitution precluded till the year 1808, was not accom- 
plished without difficulty. Both North and South were 
guilty of complicity in carrying on this odious traffic; 
and the greed of the slave-traders and the cruelties 
of the "Middle Passage," as the voyage from Africa to 
the Western Continent was called, were increased by the 
very fact that the time was short in which the trade 
could be carried on. The debates in Congress on the 
bill prohibiting the slave-trade developed the violence 
peculiar to every contest involving the question of slavery. 
The apprehensions of the slave-holders that in prohibit- 
ing the foreign slave-trade Congress might go further and 
strike a blow at the domestic slave-trade gave vehemence 
and force to the presentation of the pro-slavery side of the 
issue. Congress passed the prohibitory act with compara- 
tive unanimity, notwithstanding the difference of opinion, 
which related more to form than substance, as far as the 
main purposes of the bill were concerned ; and the various 
religious bodies and other friends of freedom in the North 
had a day of rejoicing when the foul blot of the African 
slave-trade was effaced from the civilization of America. 

In the early years of the nineteenth century, Thomas 
Jefferson, then President of the United States, accom- 

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A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

plished the purchase from France of Louisiana, a terri- 
tory comprising what is now the entire States of Arkansas, 
Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska, North and South Dakota, 
parts of the States of Minnesota, Kansas, Colorado, Mon- 
tana, Wyoming, Louisiana and Oklahoma, all of the 
Indian Territory. Congress divided this vast domain 
into two Territories by the thirty-third parallel of latitude, 
giving to that part which lay south the name of "Orleans" 
and to that which lay north of it "Louisiana." Later, in 
1812, when Orleans was admitted as a State, it was called 
"Louisiana"; and the northern part of the purchase re- 
ceived the name of the "Missouri Territory." 

In March, 18 18, Missouri applied to Congress for ad- 
mission to the Union as a State. No action was taken 
until the next session, when the petition was taken up 
in the House of Representatives. At once the question 
whether the Territory should be admitted as a slave State 
or a free State leaped to the front. An amendment to the 
bill providing that all persons born after the admission 
of the State should be free, and also providing for the 
gradual emancipation of persons then held as slaves, was 
opposed by Henry Clay, then Speaker of the House. 
This set the battle in array, which was to rage year in and 
year out in both Houses of Congress and throughout the 
whole country, in the deadly conflict between freedom 
and slavery. 

Mr. Clay and those who sided with him took the 
ground that Congress was without power to prescribe 
any condition to the admission of Missouri as a State, 

75 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

or to prevent slavery from existing there if the peo- 
ple so determined. Northern members struck the key- 
note of the movement against the aggression of the slave 
power by maintaining that Congress had full power to 
prohibit the introduction of slavery as a condition to the 
admission of the State. In the debate which followed, 
the extreme Southern representatives began their threats 
of a dissolution of the Union in case the North insisted 
upon excluding slavery from new territory. Finally a 
settlement was reached by which Maine, then applying 
for admission to the Union, unquestionably a free State, 
was admitted simultaneously with Missouri. The same 
bill contained a provision that in all the territory ceded by 
France to the United States north of 36 30' north latitude 
there should be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude. 
This adjustment passed into history as the "Missouri 
Compromise," and President Monroe signed the bill in 
March, 1820. Pending the long debate before its pas- 
sage, Arkansas had been created a Territory without re- 
striction as to slavery, and Missouri availed of the privilege 
of statehood conferred upon her by adopting a constitu- 
tion not only forbidding the legislature from interfering 
with slavery, but requiring an enactment of laws prohibit- 
ing the immigration of free colored persons into the State. 
This reopened the struggle in Congress, but slavery tri- 
umphed and Missouri became a State August 10, 1821. 

Henry Clay was largely instrumental in effecting the 
Missouri Compromise. His biographer, Carl Schurz, 
while disavowing the claim that Clay was the "father of 

76 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

the Missouri Compromise, " admits that the final result 
"was mainly due to Clay's zeal, perseverance, skill and 
the moving warmth of his personal appeals." Mr. Schurz 
continues: "He did not confine himself to speeches ad- 
dressed to the House, but he went from man to man ex- 
postulating, beseeching, persuading, in his most winning 
way. Even his opponents in debate acknowledged, in- 
voluntarily sometimes, the impressive sincerity of his 
anxious entreaties. . . . Adams wrote in his journal that 
one of 'the greatest results of this conflict of three 
sessions' was 'to bring into full display the talents, re- 
sources and influence of Mr. Clay/ In newspapers and 
speeches he was praised as 'the great pacificator.' " l 

Thus the compromises of the Convention of 1787 
which secured the rights of the slave-holders in the South- 
ern States were followed by the compromises of 1820 
which secured to them the right of extending slavery to 
the new Territory of Arkansas and the new State of Mis- 
souri. But the outcome of the struggle was favorable to 
freedom. It established by a true interpretation of the 
Constitution that Congress had power to prohibit slavery 
in the Territories. President Monroe, before signing the 
bill which embodied the compromise, submitted to his 
Cabinet the question whether Congress had a consti- 
tutional right to prohibit slavery in a Territory. The 
unanimous answer of his Cabinet, which included John 
Quincy Adams, of Massachusetts, William H. Crawford, 
of Georgia, John C. Calhoun, of South Carolina, Smith 

1 Carl Schurz, "Henry Clay," vol. I, p. 193. 

77 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Thompson of New York and William Wirt, of Mary- 
land, was in the affirmative. 

The country rested securely on this second series of 
compromises, and all was tranquil in Washington and in 
Congress, so far as slavery was concerned, during the 
presidency of General Jackson, save as occasional out- 
bursts of indignation came from Southern Senators and 
Representatives when anti-slavery petitions disturbed their 
tranquillity. At the same time there was a steady growth 
of anti-slavery sentiment at the North, and indignation 
was provoked at the South by an increasing volume of 
anti-slavery publications circulated at the North, and 
which, to a greater or less extent, occasionally found their 
way in the slave-holding communities. 

A good illustration of the effect produced by these 
Northern efforts appears in a letter, which I found 
among my father's papers, written by John Forsyth, then 
a Senator from Georgia and a leading Southern Demo- 
crat, to Mr. Van Buren, then Vice-President, under date 
of August 5, 1835. This letter was doubtless sent to my 
father by Mr. Van Buren in order that he might do what 
he could to prevent the mischief of which Mr. Forsyth 
complained. It runs as follows: 

My Dear Sir: 

Your "Emancipators" and "Human-rights men," of 
New York are at work raising the devil through the 
whole Southern Country. You will see the Post-office 
in Charleston Harbor broken open and bonfires made of 
papers sent through the office. All parties unite to write 
to Postmaster Hagar, in fixed resolve to prevent the cir- 

78 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

dilation of those papers, the laws of the United States to 
the contrary notwithstanding. The effect of this state 
of excitement can be easily foretold; and unless the 
most decided steps are taken in New York, the present 
seat of the conspirators, to break them up, I should not 
be at all surprised at a decisive renewed movement to 
establish the Southern Confederacy. 

Kendall has gone very far in his answer to Hagar, 
which yet will be put to other postmasters, and I have 
advised Hagar, confidentially, to send back everything of 
that sort received at his office to the fountain-head from 
which it issued. This course, if followed everywhere, will 
prevent the extensive circulation of the monies sent from 
New York but will not prevent the effect of the tolerance 
of the New York authorities and people of New York of 
the wretches who are scattering fire-brands from within 
her limits. Instead of mobbing the poor blacks, a little 
more mob discipline of the white incendiaries would be 
wholesome at home and abroad. I would have written 
the Governor to advise some ways and means to save the 
reputation and influence of the great city but I suppose 
he is philandering at some of the watering-places, and all 
I can do is to throw out this little paper kite to find out 
how the wind may be made to blow. A portion of the 
magician's skill is required in this matter be assured and 
the sooner you set the imps to work the better. 

Truly yours, Jqhn Forsyth 

Mr. Forsyth, who was afterward Secretary of State in 
Mr. Van Buren's Cabinet, was an easy-going, amia- 
ble man, a leader in his party, conservative and opposed 
to all extremes. He looked upon slavery as an institution 
protected by the Constitution and essential to the rights of 
the South and the security of the Union, but his letter ex- 
hibits the spirit of antagonism between freedom and slavery 
which was destined to outrun all his prognostications. 

79 



CHAPTER VI 

WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON — INCIDENT OF JOHN SMOTHERS — STORY OF THE 
COLORED DOOR-KEEPER — BUNKER'S MANSION HOUSE IN NEW YORK — 
AARON BURR — NEW YORK IN 1834 — LETTER, 1838 — MARTIN VAN 
BUREN — HIS CAREER — INAUGURATION AS PRESIDENT — BENJAMIN F. 
BUTLER'S RESIGNATION OF ATTORNEY-GENERALSHIP — LETTER OF 
FELLX GRUNDY. 

THE most noted agitator in the cause of emancipa- 
tion had made his appearance in Massachusetts in 
the person of William Lloyd Garrison, whose name will 
be perpetually linked with the progress of the anti-slavery 
sentiment of the North. In January, 1 831, he began the 
publication of an abolitionist paper called The Liberator. 
He represented all that was most extreme and violent in 
hostility to slavery on the ground of humanity and re- 
ligion, and devoted himself to the single purpose of its 
overthrow by every means. He anticipated John Brown 
by thirty years and threw himself into the struggle with a 
fanaticism equal to that of the martyr of Harper's Ferry. 
The Liberator stirred the South into a fury. In 
Georgetown, in the District of Columbia, it was made a 
penal offence for any person of color to take a copy from 
the post-office. The penalty was a fine of twenty dollars 
or thirty days' imprisonment, with the alternative that if 
the offender was unable to pay the fine or the fees for im- 

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A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

prisonment he should be sold into slavery for four months. 
In North Carolina, Garrison was indicted and in Georgia 
a reward of five thousand dollars was offered for his trial 
and conviction. All this now seems more ludicrous than 
serious, but gives a siiiking illustration of the impotent 
rage which then filled the minds of the Southern slave- 
holders against the Northern disturbers of their peace. 
Meanwhile, in spite of internal dissensions, recrimina- 
tions and the violent oppositions of conservative and 
peaceably inclined people, the anti-slavery agitators at 
the North, by meetings, societies, conventions, publications 
and indefatigable agencies succeeded, within a compara- 
tively few years after the first publication of The Liberator, 
in maintaining nearly two thousand organizations having 
altogether nearly two hundred thousand members. 

Outside of the Abolitionists, some of whom appeared 
to take more interest in the colored people of the South 
than in their white brethren of the North, the color line 
was more strongly drawn at the North, in practical social 
contact, than at the South, where the slaves mingled 
freely with their masters and mistresses. I remember my 
great surprise when our faithful family servant,' John 
Smothers, by name, who always came North with us and 
never dreamed of availing of the privileges of what was 
called "The Underground Railroad " to Canada, went 
with me one night to Peel's Museum to see the perform- 
ance of Monsieur Adrien, a famous prestidigitator, as he 

1 Doubtless employed by Benjamin F. Butler on the basis referred to on j>. 
55 ante. — Ed. 

8i 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

would now be called. Arriving at the door of the hall, I 
was greatly shocked at finding that John would not be 
permitted to go in with me and was bitterly disappointed 
at the prospect of losing the enjoyment to which I had 
looked forward with great delight. The door-keeper was 
inexorable. The only place for my companion was up 
in the top gallery. Fortunately a gentleman, perceiving 
my predicament, volunteered to take me in with his party. 
To this John assented, and he rejoined me at the close 
of the performance. 

While this incident greatly impressed me, a far more 
tragic occurrence had a much deeper effect in exciting in 
me an abhorrence of slavery as it showed itself close at 
hand in our Washington home. A colored man who had 
acquired his freedom was employed in one of the depart- 
ments as a door-keeper and messenger. He belonged to 
that class in Washington which has always furnished 
competent attendants for the halls and corridors of the 
government buildings. He was trusted and respected by 
his superiors and had an excellent character for fidelity and 
intelligence. His wife was a slave girl whose master lived 
in Georgetown, District of Columbia, and the two chil- 
dren of the marriage, according to the immemorial law of 
slavery, partook of the condition of the mother, and, as 
her offspring, were the property of her master. The 
father had a small house and plot of land in Georgetown, 
and the little family were apparently in a very happy 
situation. Returning to his home one afternoon he found 
the fire burning on the hearth and the kettle hanging over 

82 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

it, as usual, in preparation of the evening meal; but the 
place was empty. Neither wife nor children could be 
found. In a few minutes he learned the reason. His 
neighbors told him that, in his absence, they had been 
sold by their master to a Southern trader, who had taken 
them all to the slave pen at Alexandria. Frantic with 
grief and rage, he rushed back to Washington, told the 
pitiable tale to my father, who interested himself at once, 
and securing the aid of some other friends of the unfor- 
tunate man, furnished him with the money necessary to 
buy back his wife and children, and dispatched him late 
at night to Alexandria for their rescue. Filled with grati- 
tude and hope he reached the slave pen, and there, to 
his horror, found his wife a raving maniac by the bodies 
of the two children, whom she had killed in her frenzy. 
She never knew how she became an infanticide. Years 
afterward, when in freedom and in her right mind, she 
came to our home in New York to see my mother, and 
said that her mind was a blank as to everything that 
had happened on that fatal night. 

This was surely enough to make us all Abolitionists at 
heart, and such, I think, we all became. The very 
word "Abolitionist," however, at that time implied crim- 
inal aggression upon constituted human law and the di- 
vine order of things; and yet the instance I have given is 
only one of a thousand like it, exposed in later years to 
the gaze of the whole country in Charles Sumner's great 
speech on "The Barbarism of Slavery " and in the thrill- 
ing pages of "Uncle Tom's Cabin." 

83 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

During my father's official life at Washington, he 
made migrations to the North every summer, spending 
part of the time in New York and a part at "The Hill" 
in Stuyvesant, and at some of the summer resorts. Wash- 
ington was comparatively deserted during the summer 
months. Few members of the Cabinet remained there. 
President Van Buren had a cottage on the grounds of 
the United States Hotel at Saratoga, where he spent much 
of the summer and where the business of the Chief Execu- 
tive of the nation was conveniently transacted. The im- 
mense machinery of the foreign and domestic affairs of 
the government, as it is now carried on, was then unknown. 
As for the Attorney-General, in the recess of the Supreme 
Court he had little to occupy him at the seat of govern- 
ment, and my father was able to come North and argue 
many cases in the courts of the State for clients whom he 
was still able to retain. In New York he sometimes 
stayed at Bunker's Mansion House in Broadway near the 
Battery. It was a type of hotel not now to be found — a 
spacious brick structure with ample halls, sitting-rooms, 
and upstairs bedchambers, in which its proprietors, of 
the best Nantucket stock, made their guests as comfort- 
able as if they were within their own homes. 

A select class of people availed themselves of these 
peculiar advantages, and Mrs. Bunker presided daily with 
dignity at a table around which a great many distin- 
guished people gathered from time to time. It was in 
one of the parlors of the Mansion House that I remember 
seeing Aaron Burr, a dapper little old man with a round 

84 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

head, entertaining two ladies. My mother had sent me 
in to take a look at him preparatory to giving me some 
account of his strange and eventful career, which had been 
fatally clouded by his killing Alexander Hamilton in a 
duel at Weehawken. 

Close by the Mansion House and fronting on the 
Battery and Bowling Green were the fine residences of 
New York merchants. The first Presbyterian Church 
stood on the north side of Wall Street, just east of Broad- 
way, across the street from Trinity Church, a short dis- 
tance above which stood Grace Church, then, as now, 
numbering many leading Episcopalians in its congrega- 
tion. Near at hand was the City Hotel, kept by Chester 
Jennings, a most popular host, who possessed what is 
said to be the royal faculty of remembering names and 
faces. Thus, at that time, much of the social life of 
New York was below the City Hall Park; but the city 
was extending beyond this limit. For a time it seemed 
as though the eastern portion, in the direction of Divis- 
ion Street, would become a fashionable center. Henry 
Rutgers maintained something of manorial state in a 
mansion which for many years was a landmark in that 
part of the city. He owned large tracts of land in the 
neighborhood, much of which was leased on favorable 
ground rents to tenants, many of whom built and occu- 
pied fine residences. But the tendency of the better 
social element was toward the west side, and the Rut- 
gers region was abandoned to inferior uses, especially 
along Broadway and the side streets. The march of im- 

85 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

provement was steady and rapid; and year by year, as we 
revisited the North, we found the great metropolis growing 
in size and beauty, although large spaces of unimproved 
property intervened between the buildings on either side 
of Broadway, and pigs still wandered in the streets. 

[The following letter, written about this time from New 
York where he was a short time in school (probably the 
Grammar School of the New York University), shows my 
father's extraordinary maturity of thought, and is inserted 
here as an illustration of his early mental attainments. A 
few errors are retained just as they occurred. — Ed.] 

., _ „ "New York, March 3d, 1838. 

My Dear Father: d d 

It is Saturday and as I have not much of anything 
to do I take the opportunity to write you a few lines. I 
suppose you have by this time received Mother's letter 
requesting you to send on your Cicero for my use. We 
finished Sallust a few days ago, and are now reading 
Cicero's Oration against Cataline in fine style. I like it 
very much, although much more elegant and therefore 
harder, than the simple narrative of Jugurtha in Sallust. 
We read in Greek "Mythological dialogues" written by 
Lucan. They are highly amusing; and by the way many 
thanks to both Miss Kane and you for the kind present 
you sent by your last letter, they being mostly translations 
from Ovid they bring back to my mind many of the fables 
that I read with Mr. McVean, they were then very in- 
teresting but now they are still more so. Mother, Aunt 
Mary and Mag are now engaged in a disputation that 
you will be here tonight or soon, as you have said nothing 
about it in your letter to us I hope you will come. 

What a horrid affair this murder 1 at Washington 
is, nothing occupies the mind of persons here but that 

1 The reference is to a duel between Jonathan Cilley, of Maine, and William 
J. Graves, of Kentucky, which took place at Bladensburg, Md., near Washing- 
ton, on February 4, 1838. — Ed. 

86 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

and it is on the lips of all. M rs Wise, Jones, Graves and 
Web are all condemned. Web and Wise appear to me 
as if this passage of Sallust in which Adherbal says of 
Jugurtha "Homo omnium quos terra sustinet sceleratis- 
simus" might justly be quoted. I suppose great excite- 
ment prevails at Washington on the subject. Congress 
I see has taken upon itself to investigate the matter but 
it will not avail anything I suppose for every matter of 
this nature is out of the line which is marked out for 
Congress to observe as most say but I hope it will not be 
passed over in silence. 

Write soon to me if you have any time but I hope 
soon to see your bodily shape. 

Good bye! 

W. H. A. Butler. 1 

In November, 1836, Mr. Van Buren was elected 
President of the United States by an electoral vote of 170 
out of a total of 294. Of the other candidates, General 
Harrison received 73, Mr. Webster 14, and Mr. Hugh L. 
White, of Tennessee, 26. The popular vote showed a 
majority for Mr. Van Buren over all the other candidates 
of 24,893. This was the fitting culmination of a remark- 
able political career surpassing in continual success that 
of any other public man in New York. The first office 
held by Mr. Van Buren was that of Surrogate of his 
native county of Columbia in 1808. In 18 13 he was 
elected a State Senator; in 181 5 Attorney-General of 
New York; in 1821 United States Senator, resigning after 
his election as Governor in 1828. The latter office he 
in turn resigned to become Secretary of State in the Cabi- 

1 Until his admission to the bar in 1843 m y father used his full name, 
William Howard Allen Butler, but at that time dropped the Howard as the 
signature was inconveniently long. — Ed. 

87 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

net of Jackson. He was appointed Minister to England 
August i, 1 831; was elected Vice-President in 1832, and 
President in November, 1836. He was thus almost con- 
tinuously in public life during a period of nearly thirty 
years, rising step by step to the highest office in the gift 
of the people. Besides filling these positions, he served 
with distinguished ability in the State Constitutional Con- 
vention of 1 82 1 and was influential in shaping the organic 
law it gave to the State of New York. The rejection of his 
nomination as Minister to England by the Whig majority 
of the United States Senate can not be considered in any 
other light than one of his successes. It was a blunder 
on the part of his political opponents that paved the way 
to his election to the vice-presidency and made him the 
presiding officer of the body which had refused to con- 
firm his nomination. 

During all these years Mr. Van Buren had run the 
gauntlet of the coarse and malignant vituperation which 
the Whig press and partisans, while claiming for their 
party superior intelligence and respectability, were always 
using as a weapon of political warfare. His caution and 
circumspection in spoken and written declarations, a 
trait inherited from his Holland ancestry, were denounced 
as "non-committalism and duplicity." The sagacity he 
exercised in public affairs was condemned as "intrigue 
and cunning'*; and his ascendency in the councils of 
his own party as "selfishness and greed of power." He 
was nicknamed "The Little Magician" and characterized 
as a fox. Meanwhile he was recognized by his able asso- 

88 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

dates at the bar and bench as a great lawyer; his party 
leadership was not only acquiesced in, but forced upon 
him, by his political coadjutors; the people of the State had 
made him governor and the people of the United States 
had made him president. His bitterest enemies found 
nothing to assail in his private life, and his integrity as a 
public officer was never attacked. His even temper and 
imperturbable kindness of nature were conspicuous traits 
of his character, cementing his personal and political 
friendships, and even in the arena of partisan strife were 
often damaging to his opponents. 

All these things conspired to quicken the boyish en- 
thusiasm with which I witnessed the inauguration cere- 
monies on the eastern portico of the Capitol on the 4th 
of March, 1837, saw Chief-Justice Taney administer the 
oath of office to the new President, and listened to the 
inaugural address. 

The satisfaction of our home circle at the success with 
which the career of our honored friend of many years was 
crowned was wholly free from any elements of self-in- 
terest or advantage. Mr. Van Buren would gladly have 
made my father Secretary of State or placed at his disposal 
any office in the gift of the national Executive, but my 
father was impatient to take up his residence in the city 
of New York and there resume the practice of his pro- 
fession. At the special request of his chief, he retained 
the office of Attorney-General until September 15, 1838, 
when his resignation was accepted by Mr. Van Buren in 
a letter in which the President wrote: "However deep 

89 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

my regret at parting with you, I am nevertheless too well 
satisfied that justice to yourself and family requires the 
step on your part to hesitate in complying with your 
wishes." Before his retirement from office my father 
had already settled his family in New York and on his 
return to private life entered at once into active practice 
in that city. 

[The following note shows the friendly relations ex- 
isting between my grandfather, his successor and the 
President: 

Nashville, July 26th, 1838. 

Dear Sir: 

I received yours of the nth instant, some days since, 
and delayed an answer until I could give you one of a 
more satisfactory character than I was able to do at 
the time it was received. I thank you for the favorable 
opinion you entertain of my appointment as your suc- 
cessor — all I can say is, that I will try to deserve it — al- 
though I am conscious that I shall labor under some 
disadvantages of which others do not understand the ex- 
tent as well as I do. 

I shall feel under great obligations to you for bring- 
ing up the business of the office and clearing it of exist- 
ing difficulties as to the cases in the Supreme Court — I 
hope your notes will be copious — this will be of more 
benefit to me than of trouble to you. 

I spent day before yesterday at the Hermitage, the 
late President's health is reasonably good — he is now a 
member of the Presbyterian Church — and his mind and 
feelings are more calm and serene than I have ever known 
them — I presented your respects to him as requested in 
your letter — he spoke in the warmest terms of friend- 
ship of you, and requested me to return his best respects, 
when I wrote to you. 

90 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Our political affairs look better here, — Mr. Clay, I 
believe, cannot get the Tennessee vote — several important 
movements are on foot unfavorable to him, which I think 
will have the desired effect. 

Mrs. Grundy's health is bad, so much so, that she 
will not go on to Washington with me — I wish to be there 
by the first of Sept. in order to supply my deficiency of 
information before it may be necessary to act. 

Your friend, 

Felix Grundy. 

Be so good as to forward the communications or 
notes respecting the suits by ist of Sept. — F. Gr. 

To Benj. F. Butler, Esq. 

I add here an extract from another letter dated March 
28, 1837, recently published in "the First Forty Years of 
Washington Society," edited by Gaillard Hunt. The let- 
ter was written by Mrs. Samuel Harrison Smith and refers 
to the troubles of Mr. Pettrich, a German sculptor who 
was then seeking a professional engagement on the Capi- 
tol. Mrs. Smith writes: 

"Mrs. Taylor and I are the most zealous suitors on his 

behalf. She with the Presd , I with his bosom friend, 

Mr. Butler. I have written him two letters containing 
Mr. Pettrich's history, &c, Mrs. Butler came to see me 
in consequence, and seemed so tenderly interested, that I 
have great hopes, though she says Mr. B. can say nothing 
at present. ... I think Mr. and Mrs. Butler will be his 
assisting friends, in case he does not get work, for they are 
the most benevolent people — sincere, zealous Christians. 
The more I know the better I like this lovely family. 
Most happy is Mr. Van B. in having such a friend and 
adviser."— EdJ 



91 



CHAPTER VII 

CHARLES BUTLER— VOYAGE TO EUROPE— DICKENS— LETTER HOME, 1 83 8— 
PARIS — HOMEWARD VOYAGE INTERRUPTED — A "WELLER" ANECDOTE 
— TRD? TO IRELAND WITH JOHN VAN BUREN — ROME — POMPEII — EX- 
TRACTS FROM JOURNAL — RETURN HOME. 

MY uncle, Charles Butler, then also a resident of 
New York, who had been actively engaged in pro- 
moting the development of Chicago and other portions 
of the West, had become somewhat broken in health, 
and about this time was advised to make a voyage to 
Europe. He very kindly included me in his party, which 
consisted of himself, his wife and his son Ogden, a six- 
year-old boy. We sailed from New York for Liverpool 
in the packet ship Pennsylvania, commanded by Captain 
Smith, on July 7, 1838. "Going abroad" as a trip to 
Europe has been so long conventionally phrased, was at 
that time the privilege of very few Americans. Relatives 
and friends accompanied the outward-bound voyagers as 
far as Sandy Hook, where the leave-takings were measured 
not only by the sea space of separation, but also by the 
impossibility of communications except at intervals reck- 
oned by months. 

While life on an ocean-sailing packet in 1838 was the 
acme of enforced idleness, it had its advantages over the 
rapid steam passages of to-day in the longer time given 

92 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

for the healthful influences of sea air, and the greater 
certainty of pleasant companionship. The best company 
was always to be found on the first-class ships, which 
then carried their passengers, usually in from twenty-four 
to thirty days from New York to Liverpool. Our ship's 
company on the Pennsylvania was no exception to the 
rule, and our twenty-one-days' passage was very like a 
pleasure excursion on a well-managed yacht. 

I recall as one of our passengers a gentleman of intel- 
ligence and taste who had brought with him an enter- 
taining book that had lately appeared and achieved an 
instant popularity. This was "Pickwick Papers" by 
"Boz." The owner of the nom de plume had not been 
disclosed as yet, although not long afterward the mystery 
was solved as chronicled in the quatrain: 

"Who the Dickens Boz could be 
Puzzled many a learned elf, 
Till "Boz" at last turned out to be 
Who but the very Dickens' self." 

One day, our friend who was the fortunate possessor 
of the "Pickwick Papers" called special attention to the 
descriptive powers of the author, evinced, most graphi- 
cally, as he thought, in the opening sentences of the fifth 
chapter where Mr. Pickwick is described as leaning 
"over the balustrades of Rochester Bridge contemplating 
nature, and waiting for breakfast." It is indeed a charm- 
ing bit of pen-painting of the quaint old city and its sur- 
roundings. Of course my friend was wholly ignorant of 

93 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

the associations which endeared the old city to Dickens 
and which influenced him in choosing it for his home; 
and I have always thought that the selection of that par- 
ticular passage as an instance of his power as a writer was 
a genuine tribute to the genius of Dickens before his 
name was known in the world of letters. 1 

Arriving at Liverpool on July 28, I thought the old 
Adelphi Hotel, then the favorite resort of all American 
visitors to that port, the most delightful resting place im- 
aginable for a wave-tossed wanderer. In London I was 
present at a Sunday morning service at the Royal Chapel 
of St. James, and had a good opportunity of seeing the 
youthful Queen, who had just entered upon what was 
to be her long and eventful reign. 

[The lad of thirteen wrote to his parents a long letter 
on his impressions of England, which it seems appro- 
priate to introduce in its entirety, without correction, in a 

1 My father also was always keenly appreciative of Dickens' genius and never 
failed in his enjoyment of the "Pickwick Papers." 

Of the visit which the author made four years later to America my father once 
wrote: 

"I am reminded of Dickens' first visit to the United States in 1842. I went 
with my father and mother to an evening entertainment given by Mr. Bryant to 
Dickens and his wife. Probably his experience on this occasion, quite memo- 
rable for me, was described, in kind at least, in a letter to Forster his subsequent 
biographer, in which he says: 'I go to a party in the evening and am so enclosed 
and hemmed about by people, stand where I will, that I am exhausted for want 
of air.' I presume I did my small share of the enclosing and hemming about 
process, for naturally I had the eager curiosity of a youth who had devoured the 
Pickwick Papers, and everything else that Dickens had written since their publi- 
cation, to see and hear the great novelist. All that I can now recall of his words 
that evening are a few which expressed his observation of the different style in 
which oysters were served in Boston and New York respectively. In the former 
city he had seen the oysters scolloped, in the latter city they were stewed!"— Ed. 

94 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

chronicle of his reminiscences intended especially for his 
grandchildren. — Ed.] 

Brighton, August 25th, 1838. 
My Dear Parents: 

I believe that my last letter was dated from London, 
since that time I have seen a great deal of the Southern 
part of England and also the Isle of Wight. But before 
I mention anything else I must tell you what I saw at 
London a day or two before we left. On thursday (16) 
the Queen went in person to prorogue Parliament and of 
course I went in person to see her go for we could not 
obtain admission without an order from the Lord high 
Chancellor. It was the most splendid pageant I ever 
beheld. I got down too late to see her go, but Uncle 
Charles and Aunt Eliza having gone before me, did. She 
was in a state coach drawn by eight cream colored horses. 
This carriage is a most splendid affair and cost 7000 
pounds sterling upwards of 30,000 dollars. It was built 
70 years ago from a very curious design, the body of the 
coach is borne by four tritons, two carry the coachman 
on their shoulders, who puts his feet on a scallop shell 
with sea plants growing around it, these tritons are repre- 
sented as blowing horns to announce the approach of the 
Monarch of the Ocean. The pole is a cluster of spears, 
the roof of the carriage is upheld by four palm trees and 
on the top stand three boys intended for the three King- 
doms, England, Ireland and Scotland, bearing up the 
crown, from which wreaths of laurel fall to the four cor- 
ners of the roof. The Queen's carriage was preceeded 
by five others, containing her attendants etc., all drawn 
by six horses. After these came her 'little Majesty' 
in the above mentioned vehicle, she was accompanied 
by the Countess of Sutherland (said to be the most 
beautiful woman in Court), and a gentleman whose 
name I did not learn. The Queen looked quite pretty, 
she is indeed a very sweet looking amiable sort of a girl, 
quite short, (about my height as I have been told several 
times,) fair complexion etc., etc. On Saturday (18) we 

95 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

left London for Windsor where we of course visited the 
Castle. As the Queen was expected very shortly we were 
not allowed to see the private apartments, but were ad- 
mitted to the State apartments, which are splendidly and 
regally furnished. We went to Eton College, about a mile 
from Windsor where we saw its library containing 20,000 
volumes. From Windsor we went to a little place called 
Virginia Water, which was a favorite residence of George 
IV in summer and which he adorned in a beautiful man- 
ner. This monarch certainly had a most exquisite taste, 
if we may judge from his decorations of this beautiful 
spot, they are all in taste and have the appearance of 
natural beauty rather than artificial. From this place we 
proceeded to South Hampton situated on an arm of the 
sea in the County of Hampshire. This place is not one 
of much interest except on account of an old Abbey sit- 
uated about 3 miles from it which was erected during 
the reign of Henry III and destroyed by Henry VIII. 
This is a beautiful and romantic spot, completely in ruins, 
and most magnificent ruins they are, it is called 'Nettly 
Abbey/ We crossed from S. Hampton over to Lyming- 
ton a town situated on the sea coast and from tfience to 
Yarmouth (Isle of Wight). Nothing remarkable there. 
Thence to New Port which is the chief town on the island. 
Not far from here was Carisbrooke Castle, the place 
where the unfortunate Charles I was confined before his ex- 
ecution. It is now in ruins, but the window where Charles 
attempted to escape is still shown. The well is 300 feet 
deep and is the same which was there when the Castle 
was built. Water is drawn up by means of a donkey. 
We went from thence to Black Gang Chine which is 
a wild and romantic spot. The meaning of the name 
Black Gang we could not discover, the Chine is a vast 
chasm in the rocks. On the shore it extends quite far 
back and has a very forbidding appearance, it was on 
this coast that the ship Clarendon was wrecked. We 
spent the night at the 'Sand Rock' Hotel not far from 
the Chine, which is quite a fashionable resort, it is some- 
thing I should think like Rockaway near New York. 

96 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

The next day we completed our journey and formed al- 
most the complete circuit of the island. At Brading we 
saw the house where Leigh Richmond formerly resided, 
and the church (the oldest in the Kingdom) where he 
formerly preached, also in the church yard the tomb of 
the 'Young Cottager.' On Friday afternoon we came 
from the isle of Wight and crossed to Portsmouth in- 
tending to take the Havre Packet to France but found 
that none would sail until Monday so after seeing what 
we could of this place which is only remarkable as a 
naval station we engaged places in the coach to Brighton 
and on Saturday morning started for that place, unfor- 
tunately it rained all the time we were coming which 
rendered our situation on the top of the coach very un- 
pleasant. They construct their coaches here very differ- 
ently from what you do, having only seats for 4 inside and 
for 8 or 12 outside, the outside is much the pleasantest 
on a clear day but when it rains you can easily imagine its 
comfort. We got to Brighton safely, however, and are 
here now Monday Aug. 27 1838. 

This is a beautiful place the houses are more elegant 
than in any place I have been in. Most of them board- 
ing houses as Brighton has but few inhabitants of its 
own. We are at the 'Old Ship Hotel' rather a singular 
name but a very comfortable house. We shall remain 
here probably until Wednesday morning when we start 
for France embarking for Dieppe — thence to Paris- 
Tell Hatty that I received her letter and yours safely 
and was very much gratified to see that she was so thought- 
ful and good as to 'leave the breakfast table' and write 
to me and I hope the other girls will make the same sacri- 
fice not excepting Lizzy. Of course I shall hear from 
Ben without his being told. I saw John Van Buren in 
London, he is quite a lion there as they consider him the 
'heir apparent' he has been presented to the Queen and 
had the pleasure of speaking to her etc. Mr. Tudor has 
gone off to Hungary and therefore I cannot expect to 
see him. Tell Miss Murray (Mag) if you see her that I 
have not yet seen her sister but will perhaps in Paris. 

97 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

When this letter reaches you, you will not perhaps be in 
New York. If you are at Stuyvesant give my love to 
Grand Pa, Grand Ma and all. I do not know how we 
shall return, Aunt Eliza does not like steamships and so I 
suppose we shall have to cross in the old way. The idea 
of going back so is very shocking to me but I hope that 
as it will be going home I shall not think so much of it. 
Uncle Charles is much better than he was and seems 
to improve very much. I do not see how any one can 
help being healthy in such a place as this, the sea air is 
so invigorating and healthy, it is a great place for inva- 
lids. I see by the papers that there has been quite a 
fire at New York. This is all the news I can find with the 
exception of the death of Comrde. Rogers which I noticed. 
We shall go back to London after our return to Paris, 
where I will write you again if I can. I shall not be able 
to in France as we will go in such a hurry and be so much 
occupied in seeing that it will take all my time. There is 
a great Cricket match to day here at the ' Royal Cricket 
Grounds' and I shall go and see it I believe. There 
never were such people as the English for amusements, 
Horse races, Regattas, Cricket Matches, Hunts and all 
kinds of sports in the open air, are constantly set on foot. 
Give my love to all, I am very anxious to see you all 
although not exactly ' home sick' and am looking forward 
to the time when we shall again meet with great pleasure. 
I hope my dear parents that I shall profit by all I see, 
not only in a temporal but also in a spiritual point of 
view and that as I am separated from you I may throw 
myself more upon the guidance and assistance of my 
heavenly father. 

Your dutiful and affectionate son, 

W. H. A. Butler. 
B. F. Butler, Esq., 
New York. 

P. S. — To my dear little sister Lizzy. 

My dear Lizzy — Brother Willy wants to see little 
sister very much indeed and doesn't know what he shall 

9 8 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

do without her. Brother Willy is a great way off from 
Lizzy and has sailed in that great ship which Lizzy 
saw. Brother Willy has seen a great many things and 
a great many pretty little girls but he hasn't seen any little 
girl so pretty as his dear little sister Lizzy. Cousin Oggy 
is with Brother Willy and Cousin Oggy is riding on a 
donkey now, a donkey is a little animal smaller than a 
little pony and Cousin Oggy is on a little brown donkey 
and a boy has got a stick and is driving the donkey 
and Cousin Oggy sits on the donkey's back. Brother 
Willy hopes that Lizzy will write him a long letter 
and tell him how she is and Brother Willy hopes to 
come home very soon and see his dear papa and mama 
and brother Benny and sisters and his dear little sister 
Lizzy. 

Your affectionate brother Willy. 
To Miss Lizzy Butler. 

In Paris we were kindly entertained by General Cass, 
who, as Secretary of War, had been a close associate in 
General Jackson's Cabinet, with my father, who was 
appointed to succeed him for the interval between his 
retirement in the fall of 1836 and the 4th of March 1837. 
The duties of Attorney-General and Secretary of War had 
been simultaneously discharged by my father in order 
to relieve General Jackson of the necessity of bringing 
into the Cabinet a new member within a few months of 
the expiration of his presidency. 

My uncle's health not being fully restored, he deter- 
mined to remain in Europe and spend the winter in Italy, 
arranging for my return home in company with and under 
the care of John Van Buren, son of the President, with 
whom I embarked at Liverpool in the steamer Liverpool, 

99 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

one of the earliest of the English transatlanic steamers. 
Soon after leaving the Channel we encountered heavy 
head-winds and seas against which the vessel made very 
slow progress. I was in a state of abject wretchedness, 
occupying the top berth in a state-room in which my 
companion was a little old Englishman, who, like the im- 
mortal Wellers, had a persistent habit of pronouncing 
W in place of V, and vice versa. But for my companion- 
ship on shipboard with him I should never have believed 
that Dickens had drawn the peculiar dialect of the Well- 
ers from real life. 

Every morning as we steamed westward my fellow 
passenger would call for the cabin steward, miscalled ap- 
parently for the purpose of putting into requisition the 
wrong consonant, "Vaiter." As soon as the door was 
opened he would ask, "Vaiter, vitch vay is the vind?" 
to which the steward's habitual response was, "West 
nor-west, sir," and from the lower berth would come the 
despondent ejaculation, "Vest nor-vest ? Vot a vind!" 
And "vest nor-vest" the wind continued to be, dead 
ahead, until on the tenth day out the captain informed us 
that he had only a few days' supply of coal left and that 
he concluded to put the ship about and make for Cork 
as a port of refuge. Accordingly in mid-ocean our course 
was reversed, to our great physical relief, although with 
sore disappointment. 

My homeward voyage was thus broken up, and my 
uncle on hearing of its result wrote me to join him in Paris 
and accompany him to Italy. After making with Mr. 

ioo 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Van Buren, one of the most attractive and delightful of 
companions, a tour through the Lakes of Killarney and 
northward to Dublin, I crossed the two channels, from 
Ireland to Paris, where I gladly rejoined my uncle and 
aunt, and thence journeyed with them to Rome. The 
papal Rome of Gregory XVI, in 1838, was very different 
from the regal Rome of King Humbert in 1898. The 
genius of modern improvement and the spirit of archae- 
ological research had not disturbed the lethargy of the 
ecclesiastical, medieval city. Priests and monks, beg- 
gars and contadini filled the streets, and foreigners were 
few as compared with the crowds who now swarm in the 
streets of the Eternal City. We had lodgings in the Via 
San Vitale with a certain Narducci, who held a posi- 
tion of some kind in the Pope's military establishment. 
Besides giving me lessons in Italian, he was an invalu- 
able guide, in many ways most serviceable for my ac- 
quisition of knowledge of Italian manners and customs. 
I made myself as familiar with Rome as with my native 
city of Albany, a kind of education which, perhaps, was 
more beneficial than that to which I looked forward while 
suffering on the Liverpool before her prow was turned 
eastward. 

After our long sojourn in Italy, we turned our steps 
homeward, crossing Mont Cenis by the old pass which 
furnished the highway easiest of travel across the Alps, 
returned to Paris, and then embarked in the sailing-packet 
Burgundy, commanded by Captain Lines, at that time 
and for years afterward one of the most popular captains 

101 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

of sailing-vessels and steamers, and reached home in the 
summer of 1839. 

[There are still extant a few pages from a journal 
kept by this youthful traveler during his long European 
trip which give graphic descriptions of cities visited, meet- 
ings with friends and important happenings, all too 
lengthy to insert here. 

We find from these journalistic fragments how Rome 
appeared seventy years ago to an enthusiastic and 
thoughtful American boy. Here are recorded his impres- 
sions of the Italian people, of the churches of Rome, the 
ascent of St. Peter's, of visits to artists' studios, notably 
that of Thorwaldsen, a long account of the Carnival of 
1838, and many other interesting items. 

The pages containing a description of the ruins of 
Pompeii are so vivid in portrayal and so literary in style 
that they are inserted here. — Ed.] 

"At last we reached Pompei. The town itself cannot 
be seen as it is surrounded by piles of ashes higher than 
the tops of the houses. We drove first to the amphi- 
theatre; the plan being to dismount there and walk down 
to the temple of Isis which is at the beginning of the town 
itself, there to lunch, and finish the rest afterwards. 

"As the amphitheatre has been excavated at the upper 
end of the town, it is quite a walk down to that part, 
which has been excavated so that you literally walk over 
a c i t y — t he part from the theatre to the temple of Isis 
being yet entombed. 

"The amphitheatre is of course much smaller than the 
Coliseum at Rome, but if possible more interesting as it 
is more perfect. You can easily see the plan at once and 
as most of the seats are remaining it seemed as if ready 
again to be the scene of blood and sport. It commands 
a fine view of Vesuvius and the cloud of smoke and 
stream of fire, being at once discerned by the spectators 
what must have been the consternation and alarm that 
seized them as they turned from the sports of the arena 

102 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

to seek safety in flight. It was doubly interesting to those 
of us who had read Mr. Bulwer's enchanting novel 'The 
last days of Pompei' as he had revived the characters 
who had actually lived, and also interwoven an enticing 
story so as to render almost every house, the scene of some 
event which was now called to mind with gratification. 

"We then after examining the amphitheatre sufficiently 
took the way to the temple of the Goddess of Isis — It was 
small, but very pretty, and the altar still stands, and the 
shrine for the oracle still remains as perfect as if just com- 
pleted. In fact Pompei was so taken by surprise, the work 
of destruction so soon completed, that everything was found 
in as perfect order as if freshly made, the mosaic pave- 
ments are bright and smooth, the paintings on the walls 
have a vivid and clear color, the paving of the streets re- 
tain the marks of chariot wheels, and everything, (save 
perhaps the want of roofs to the houses) gives it the ap- 
pearance of a city whose owners have deserted it but for 
a time, or very shortly, and not as the wreck of a town 
which has been mouldering in the dust for eighteen cen- 
turies. 

"It is indeed melancholy though deeply interesting, 
to wander through the streets, all is so silent, so still, so 
desolate. We enter the houses, we pass the porter's 
lodge; where is the servant to announce us? we cross 
the open court, where is the fountain that used to play ? 
we enter the little garden, (which each house has) and 
look in vain for the neatly trimmed flowers that were 
wont to spread their odors through the mansion, we look 
into the banquet halls but where is the host to receive, 
or the guests to eat, and so may we wander into the bed- 
rooms, but the couches are gone, and so are the owners, 
and we leave the house to seek elsewhere for life and 
animation. The bakers' shops look so clean and nice, the 
mill for the corn so perfect that we are tempted to believe 
that the baker has but stepped out and will soon return, 
but wait so long as we may, call as loud as we will, no foot- 
steps are heard, no response is given to our cry, and we 
pass on again. 

103 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

"But the baths are so perfect, the roofs entire, the tubs 
remaining, that surely some one will be here before long 
to bathe, but the cold bath is uncalled for, the hot one 
neglected, and the tepid one waits for an occupant, so that 
we leave the bathing houses for the open air. Hurrying 
on we pass through the forum, the temples, the schools, 
into more houses, cross more streets, but look in vain for 
the buyers and sellers, the priest and the people, the ped- 
agogue and the pupil, and at last we must conclude that it 
is a "city of the dead," whose owners will never return, 
whose streets will forever be silent, whose houses will never 
again be occupied and whose public places will moulder 
into dust before the hum of business will again be heard. 

"But here again I have been giving away to my en- 
thusiasm and am afraid that you who read my journal 
will suffer for it if you expect to have a description of 
Pompei, for it is impossible now to retrace my steps to 
the temple of Isis." 

[Here is another quotation from my father's journal, 
giving his observations while stopping over Sunday at 
a small village just outside of Genoa. — Ed.] 

"Sund. Passing the sabbath at this place, but how 
unlike the sabbath, the people in their holiday costumes 
are lounging about the square, on which stands our hotel. 
I have climbed up the high hill at the back of the town 
and was rewarded with a fine view, the Alps were before, 
and the Appenines behind us whilst at our feet lay along 
wide plain stretching to the Hadriatic. In the morning I 
had noticed a rope tied to a pole in the middle of the street 
and extending in a slanting direction to the window of a 
house fronting the square, on which stands the Cathedral 
and public fountain. On inquiry I found that a little 
girl was going to walk up it from the street to the window, 
for the amusement of the people ! ! ! And sure enough 
about four o'clock the girl made her appearance, and as- 
cended the rope and came down again to the great delight 
of the people. 

"What a state of affairs ! ! " 

104 



CHAPTER VIII 

UNITED STATES DISTRICT ATTORNEYSHD? OF NEW YORK OFFERED TO BEN- 
JAMIN F. BULTER — ACCEPTED — PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF 1840 — 
THE "LOG-CABLN AND HARD-CIDER " FRENZY — VAN BUREN'S RETIRE- 
MENT AT LINDENWALD — DEATH OF PRESIDENT HARRISON — GEORGE 
WILLLAM CURTIS — NEW YORK UNIVERSITY LAW SCHOOL — ESTABLISHED 
BY BENJAMIN F. BUTLER — LETTER OF JUSTICE STORY — GRADUATION 
AT UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK LN CLASS OF 1 843 — CLASS DINNERS. 

DURING our absence in Europe strange things had 
happened at home. Samuel Swartwout, whom 
President Jackson in 1829 had appointed Collector of 
the Port of New York against the earnest protest of Mr. 
Van Buren, had been discovered to be a defaulter to an 
enormous amount, the result of misappropriations of 
public money which he had practiced for seven years. 
Some time afterward, William M. Price, United States 
District Attorney for the Southern District of New York, 
committed suicide. These disastrous events alarmed the 
government, and President Van Buren called upon my 
father to aid him by accepting the vacant office of Dis- 
trict Attorney. 

This was, of course, a position inferior in rank to that 
of Attorney-General of the United States, but it was at 
that time peculiarly representative in New York of the 
Federal Government. John Duer, one of my father's 

I0 5 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

associates in the Revision, had held it under John Quincy 
Adams. It did not require absence from home nor pre- 
clude private practice in the courts. It was liberally 
compensated by the fees allowed by law in lieu of salary, 
and was regarded by the profession as a post of high dis- 
tinction. My father held the office during the remainder 
of Mr. Van Buren's term, and was succeeded on March 
4, 1841, by Ogden Hoffman, one of the most eminent 
and eloquent members of the New York Bar. 

The year 1840 was marked by an extraordinary and 
almost unprecedented period of political excitement. 
During the administration of Mr. Van Buren, financial 
distress and commercial failures had been wide-spread 
through the country. A mania for speculation had set 
in; a so-called credit system had supplanted sound mone- 
tary conditions, and after sowing the wind in reckless 
ventures, the trading portion of the public had reaped 
the whirlwind of disaster and ruin. 

Mr. Van Buren, in his administration of the govern- 
ment, had not swerved from the principles and policy of 
his party. He stood for sound money and the absolute 
divorce of government from the business of banking, as 
then favored by the Whig party. He resisted alike the 
pressure of friends and foes, and was true to the doctrines 
he had maintained and the pledges he had given. The 
Whig leaders found their opportunity in the prevailing 
discontent and distress, and, setting aside the claims of 
Henry Clay, nominated for the presidency, solely on the 
ground of his "availability," William Henry Harrison, of 

106 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Ohio, the so-called "Hero of Tippecanoe," giving to John 
Tyler, of Virginia, the second place on the ticket. 

These nominations were followed by a canvass unpar- 
alleled for the gross and demoralizing methods by which 
it pandered to the cravings of the people for a change 
of administration. As always under political conditions 
similar to those which then existed in the United States, 
a dissatisfied minority, clamoring for the overthrow of an 
existing administration, charged against it all the evils 
of which the people complained, and on this basis, with- 
out having any distinct principles or policy, set on foot the 
grotesque and semi-barbarous "log-cabin and hard-cider" 
campaign. 

Had I not been an eye-witness of these performances, 
I could hardly believe that a civilized people, the founders 
and promoters of free government on the western hemi- 
sphere, could have exhibited such a travesty on the serious 
business of electing a President as went on in the sum- 
mer and autumn of 1840. Carl Schurz, in his life of 
Henry Clay, says of the campaign that there has probably 
never been one "of more enthusiasm or less thought. . . . 
As soon as it was finally started, it resolved itself into a 
popular frolic. There was no end of monster mass meet- 
ings, with log cabins, raccoons and hard cider. One half 
of the American people seemed to have stopped work to 
march in processions behind brass bands or drum and 
fife to attend huge picnics, etc." Edward M. Shepard, in 
his admirable biography of Mr. Van Buren, says "The 
Whig campaign was highly picturesque. Meetings were 

107 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

measured by 'acres of men.' They gathered on the field 
of Tippecanoe. Revolutionary soldiery marched in ven- 
erable processions. Wives and daughters came with their 
husbands and fathers. There were the barrel of cider, the 
coon-skins, and the log cabin with the live raccoon running 
over it, and the latch-string hung out; for Harrison had 
told his soldiers when he left them, that never should his 
door be shut 'or the string of the latch pulled in.' 

The names of the rival candidates afforded rare op- 
portunities for the exercise of the genius of political versi- 
fiers. All over the country the air was vocal with the 
resounding campaign song: 

"What has caused this great commotion, motion, motion, 
Our country through? 
It is the ball a-rolling on, 
For Tippecanoe and Tyler too, Tippecanoe and Tyler too !" 

accompanied by the refrain: 

"Van, Van is a used-up man." 

When in September, Maine, heretofore a Democratic 
State, gave the Whig nominee for governor a small ma- 
jority, the same poetic genius which inspired the lyric 
from which I have already quoted, chronicled the event 
in lines that declared: 

"Maine went, hell-bent, 
For Governor Kent." 

The city of New York was not behind the rest of the 
organized disreputability of this extraordinary campaign. 
A large plot of vacant land on the southeast corner 

1 08 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

of Broadway and Prince Street furnished a conspic- 
uous site for a large log cabin, with accessories such as 
are described by Mr. Schurz and Mr. Shepard, while 
other similar places of rendezvous were set up elsewhere 
in the metropolis. Doubtless there were many serious 
discussions on the political issues really involved, for both 
parties included real statesmen of the highest order of 
intellect, who, in spite of the violent political antagonism, 
were truly patriotic. But their influence upon the popu- 
lar mind went for little in comparison with the effect 
produced by the reckless saturnalia of singing and shout- 
ing which culminated in exulting paeans of victory when 
Harrison and Tyler were declared to be the successful 
candidates. They received 234 electoral votes against 
60 for Mr. Van Buren and a popular majority of nearly 
150,000. 

Shortly after his retirement from the presidency, Mr. 
Van Buren established his residence in a country seat 
near Kinderhook, known in the neighborhood as the 
Van Ness estate. He refitted the old mansion and laid 
out the adjacent grounds to suit his taste, naming the place 
"Lindenwald" in allusion to the numerous linden trees 
in front of the house. 

When Mr. Van Buren left Washington on March 4, 
1 841, he came directly to my father's house in New York, 
where he made us a visit of several weeks, and where, on 
April 4, 1 841, he received the unexpected news of the 
death of President Harrison. This amiable and excellent 
man, transferred from the accustomed quiet of his home 

109 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

to the White House in Washington, had found himself 
overwhelmed not so much by any pressing duties of his 
high office as by a vast and hungry pack of office-seekers 
eager for the spoils of victory. It was told at the time 
that in his efforts to escape from them he would leave 
the White House by one of the doors in the rear of the 
building and betake himself for refuge to the house of 
Levi Woodbury, who had been Mr. Van Buren's Secre- 
tary of the Treasury. But he finally broke down and 
after a short illness found repose in the grave. John 
Tyler, who succeeded to the presidency, bitterly disap- 
pointed the Whigs. He turned a cold shoulder to the 
men whose votes had secured his election, and vetoed their 
cherished measure, the bill re-chartering the Bank of the 
United States. 

My father's house in New York was in Washington 
Place, at the northwest corner of Greene Street. A near 
neighbor on the same block was George Curtis. His son, 
George William Curtis, was my friend of many years 
and until his death, in 1892. On the west end of the 
block stood the then newly erected marble building of 
the University of the City of New York, now no longer in 
existence, as it has been replaced in later years by a more 
modern structure. To the propinquity of the University 
to our New York house was largely due the determination 
that my college course should be within its walls. In ad- 
dition to this my father had been an early friend of the 
enterprise which contemplated the founding in the city of 
New York of an institution worthy of the name and 

no 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

embracing the purposes of a true university. He had a 
great desire to teach the law as a science and devoted 
much of his time and thought to the elaboration of a 
scheme of instruction to be carried on in a law school 
of which he should be the responsible head. 

In the prosecution of this scheme my father enlisted 
the cooperation of William Kent, son of the Chancellor, 
and then high in professional repute, and David Graham, 
Jr., also one of the most brilliant members of the New 
York bar, author of a standard work on Practice and a 
very successful jury lawyer. The law department was 
inaugurated with addresses delivered by the three pro- 
fessors early in 1838 and a complete course was marked 
out, most admirable in its conception and detail. Con- 
ducting a school of law by lectures to be delivered by 
lawyers in full practice at the bar to students from law 
offices was, however, an experiment, and although some 
students were attracted, the plan was at that time pre- 
mature and impossible of success. The co-workers in 
this earliest effort to establish a school of law in the 
metropolis of the country laid the foundations on which 
in after years their successors were able with larger op- 
portunities and ampler resources to build with honor and 
profit. 1 

1 The following letter from Justice Story of the Supreme Court of the United 
States on the inauguration of the Law School of the University of New York 
shows the esteem with which my grandfather was regarded by his colleagues at 
the Bar and on the bench. — Ed. 

Cambridge, July 30, 1838. 
My Dear Sir: 

I had the pleasure of receiving a few days ago the copy of the Inaugural 
Addresses of the Law Professors of the New York University, which you had 

III 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

My own studies were pursued in the University which, 
whatever else it lacked, was strong in the department 
of classical instruction. Professor Ebenezer A. Johnson, 
who filled the chair of Latin for over fifty-three years, was 
most thoroughly equipped for his work, while in Greek 
the professor, during my time, was Tayler Lewis, a man 
of profound learning, and one of the most eminent Greek 
scholars in the country. I graduated from the university 

in 1843. 

During my college course I achieved the small dis- 
tinction of being the Class Poet. In 1842 I wrote for the 
tenth anniversary of the Philomathian Society, and deliv- 
ered on that momentous occasion, a poem entitled "The 
Future." A few days afterward a member of my family 
asked me for the manuscript and I very soon received 
the proof-sheets from the printing-office of the Demo- 
cratic Review, in which, as I then for the first time dis- 
covered, Mr. John L. Sullivan, its editor, had decided to 
publish it. As this was without any knowledge on my 

the kindness to send me. I have read them with the sincerest satisfaction; and 
I have been gratified by the high professional spirit and tone which pervades 
them. Your own is a highly finished discourse, and equally creditable to your 
taste, your judgment, and your just sense of the dignity of the profession. The 
remarks too come with a peculiar grace from one, who has long borne so distin- 
guished a part in the honors of the profession, and worn them with such a spot- 
less reputation. I hail the establishment of your Law School as a new auxiliary 
in the cause of our common science. I earnestly hope, that it may fully prosper 
and answer the noble design of its founders. I am sure that its success will 
give a new impulse to the profession, and aid rather than impair the usefulness 
of all other similar institutions. 

My personal good wishes are altogether with you, and when I add, — Melioribus 
Utere Fatis, — allow me to subscribe myself with the highest Respect 

Truly your obliged friend, 

m , „ , , -o t- -d,,™™ (Signed) Joseph Story. 

The Honorable Benjamin F. Butler, b ' J 

112 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

part I accepted his action as a marked compliment but 
must attribute it more to his great friendship for all the 
members of our family than to any merit in the poem 
itself. I have not read it for many years and would 
hardly dare to do so now. I supposed that with the 
exception of my own copy, one of a small number printed 
separately, it was utterly extinct; but was surprised to find 
it in a catalogue of the library of a collector of American 
literature, issued in November, 1900. It was included 
with some other of my publications and there was a foot- 
note as follows: " Privately printed — The first publication 
of the author — Rare." The publication, however, was not 
private, for, as I have said, it appeared in the Democratic 
Review. 

I delivered the Commencement Poem in 1843, having 
exchanged whatever higher grade of address I was entitled 
to for the sake of sustaining my character as the Class 
Poet. This Commencement Exercise has disappeared 
from my manuscripts. 

[The full list of the graduates of the class of 1843 of 
the University of New York is as follows: 

N. Beekman Bangs, Wm. H. Forman, 

James C. Blake, Amasa S. Freeman, 

Wm. P. Breed, Wm. H. Gardiner, 

John C. Brown, Stephen B. Hoffman, 

Wm. Allen Butler, Addison Hotchkiss, 

Frederic W. Downer, Samuel J. Jones, 

George W. Dubois, D. Stevens Landon, 

George L. Duyckinck, Wm. P. Lee, 

John M. Ferris, Samuel P. Leeds, 

Theo. W. Field, Edwin Ludlow, 

113 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Benjamin Mason, Alfred C. Roe, 

Edwin R. McGregor, Moses M. Vail, 

David C. Meeker, Aaron J. Vanderpoel, 

Abram Meserole, Henry Van Schaick, 

Samuel W. Putnam, Wm. A. Wheelock, 

Lewis B. Reed, Wm. H. Wilcox. 

It was the custom of the graduates to meet annually in 
the spring of each year and dine together, generally at the 
invitation of some one member of their number. This was 
an engagement which was never broken except for abso- 
lute necessity. As death depleted the list, those who were 
left felt it a sacred duty to make every effort to be present. 

The sixty-eighth dinner was held May 26, 19 10, at 
the Hamilton Club, Brooklyn, by invitation of Lewis B. 
Reed, beside whom there were present John M. Ferris 
and Henry Van Schaick. The only other surviving mem- 
ber of the class at that time was Samuel P. Leeds, who 
has since died. On May 18, 191 1, the only surviving mem- 
bers, Mr. Reed and Mr. Van Schaick, had their sixty- 
ninth dinner, on the invitation of the latter, at Sherry's, in 
New York. 

The tribute to my father's memory by his classmates 
at the dinner of 1903 is significant of the tender loyalty 
which bound the members of the class of 1843 together: 

"The few surviving members of the Class of 1843 
of New York University, at this, their 61st, Annual Re- 
union are oppressed with a special sadness as they miss 
from their little gathering to-night the beloved associate, 
who for the past sixty years, more than any other member 
has been distinguished for his loyal attendance at these 
happy re-unions, having been present at fifty-six out of 
the sixty occasions on which we have assembled. 

"William Allen Butler, our beloved brother, has, since 
our last meeting, been called to exchange the earthly 
crown of success he had so nobly won in every depart- 
ment of life, — for the more enduring and Heavenly Crown, 
and with our ranks still further broken, we lay this our 
loving tribute to his cherished memory. 

114 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

"William Allen Butler was a choice spirit, loyalty 
was inscribed upon every interest with which he was 
identified. He was not only loyal to his classmates, but 
to his Alma Mater, of whose Council he was a distin- 
guished member for more than thirty years and for a time 
its President. He was loyal to his profession, and in his 
religious life. His literary and professional attainments 
are too well known to say more than that they form a 
part of the history ty our City. 

"As from year to year one and another of our asso- 
ciates, who, in the flush of youth, entered upon life with 
us, have fallen by the way, many of them after years 
of distinguished usefulness, we see our number reduced 
from thirty-two to only nine, of whom five meet to-night 
to clasp hands in love, as they have for three score years, 
and to recall once more the memory of the departed. 

"How fondly memory dwells upon the now sainted 
Breed and Freeman whose long and faithful years in the 
ministry can never be forgotten; the cultured and refined 
Duyckinck; the sturdy Mason and Vail; the unassuming 
Roe and Brown and Field and Putnam, and the tireless 
Vanderpoel, as he waged his legal and successful battles. 

"A few more years in the ordinary course of nature 
must close the record for those of us who still remain, 
and while we cannot recall the departed, may we not 
look forward to that blessed reunion in that House and 
Home not made with hands, eternal in the Heavens." 

My father's own loyal and affectionate feeling for his 
classmates found expression in a poem written for their 
55th reunion in May, 1897, the last part of which runs 
thus: 

Here as old friendships breathe their ancient vows, 
And lights of Memory bathe our wrinkled brows, 
No place is left for sighs or vain regrets, 
The Star of Being never pales or sets; 
Old age is not life spent, but life possessed, 
The golden grain in the full measure pressed 

"5 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

And overflowing in its ample store, 

So that to him who hath is given more. 

"Happy the man," the Roman bard could say, 

"Whose word at night is 'I have lived to-day!' " 

In Life's calm evening, happier still is he 

Who can exclaim, "I hold the Past in fee." 

For us what wealth these vanished years have brought 

In all the spheres of Earthly deed and thought; 

In great events that still our memories stir, 

All which we saw, and part of which we were; 

In the strange marvels of inventive skill, 

In succor brought to every woe and ill, 

In all the onward march of Truth and Right, 

In Slavery slain in Freedom's deadliest fight, 

In the new dawn whose radiant promise lights 

Our Alma Mater on her regal Heights, 

In Thought's unfettered flight and boundless scope, 

In all the loftier reach of human hope, 

And grand unfoldings of the perfect plan 

Of Love Divine for all the Race of Man. 

Nor least, to-night, the hidden treasure grasped 

As eye meets eye and hand in hand is clasped; 

Untouched by Time, its lustre all undimmed, 

Our loving-cup with its full wealth is brimmed; 

Safe for the future, if we meet or part, 

Kept in the inmost shrine of every heart; 

Come good or evil days, come peace or strife, 

Come gain or bitter loss, come death or life, 

Whatever change may be, or chance befall, 

This bond of friendship shall survive them all ! 

It would not be doing justice to my father to omit 
mention of his devoted attachment to his Alma Mater — 
an attachment continued throughout his life. At the first 
stated meeting, after my father's death, of the Council 
of the New York University, their appreciation of his 
connection was beautifully expressed in a memorial reso- 
lution, a part of which I quote here: 

"From the time when in 1837, an< ^ at tne a £ e of twelve 
years, he entered the University Grammar School, Dr. 
Butler's life may be said to be identified with this Uni- 

116 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

versity, a period of sixty-five years. In 1839 he was 
matriculated in the Class of 1843, a class which has given 
four members to this Council, and which holds to-day the 
record, possibly unique in college history, of having met 
in regular annual re-unions since the date of its gradua- 
tion. 

"In 1862 he was elected a member of this Council; in 
1 89 1 he was made its Vice-President; in 1897 he was 
made its President, succeeding in the office his venerable 
uncle, Dr. Charles Butler, who died in that year. Next 
to that of Dr. Charles Butler, the membership of Dr. 
William Allen Butler, which continued until the time of 
his resignation in 1898, was longer than that of any other — 
thirty-six years. During that period his love to this 
university was unfailing; his loyalty to her interests, un- 
tiring; his counsels invaluable; his gifts, many. It was 
in large measure through his zeal and effective work 
connected with its organization and early nurture, that 
especially the Law School of New York University has 
attained its honorable success. 

"In this Council his service was the reflection of him- 
self; courteous, judicious, prudently circumspect, con- 
sistent and influential, of large and enlightened outlook, 
always calm and clear in counsel, always well balanced 
and efficient in action. To us, as formerly his associates 
in its work, his memory now dignifies what his chaste spirit 
touched." — Ed.] 



"7 



CHAPTER IX 

TRIP TO NASHVILLE — VISIT TO "THE HERMITAGE" — TALKS WITH GEN- 
ERAL JACKSON — HIS REMINISCENCES — CHURCH SERVICE — THE DE WITT 
CLLNTON TOAST— CORRESPONDENCE WITH FITZ-GREENE HALLECK— 
JEFFERSON DINNER, TOAST AND NULLIFICATION — LETTER FROM 
GENERAL JACKSON TO A YOUNG MAN — ANNEXATION OF TEXAS A 
LEADING ISSUE. 

IN the early spring of 1844, while engaged in the study 
of law under my father's direction, I accompanied him 
on a tour to "The Hermitage" for a visit to General 
Jackson. This was in accomplishment of a long-cher- 
ished desire on his part to see his old chief once more; 
and there was, I suppose, connected with it what would 
be called in the phraseology of to-day "some political sig- 
nificance." It was the confident expectation of Mr. 
Van Buren's friends in the North that he would receive 
from the Democratic party, at its convention to be held 
at Baltimore in the coming month of May, the nomina- 
tion for the presidency. General Jackson was known 
to be warmly in favor of his nomination and sanguine of 
his re-election. But some new and perplexing questions 
were coming to the front, among them the proposed an- 
nexation of Texas to the United States, and my father 
naturally desired to confer with General Jackson in ref- 
erence to the existing political situation. 

118 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

A journey from New York to Nashville at that time 
was a serious undertaking. It involved the crossing of 
the Alleghany Mountains by stage coach, and a long 
river trip by the Monongahela, Ohio, and Cumberland 
Rivers. But our plans were deliberately made and suc- 
cessfully executed. Starting from New York, April 2, 
1844, we went first to Washington for a few days' sojourn. 

I remember that in the railroad train from Baltimore 
to Washington, a trip which then consumed considerable 
time, we encountered a fellow passenger of a peculiar 
American type, now practically extinct. He was a middle- 
aged man, well-dressed, of good appearance, but just 
enough overcome by the stimulants in which he had been 
indulging to be extremely loquacious. He volunteered to 
engage with any of the passengers in a discussion upon any 
subject, but declared that, as he was not in a "sedentary 
mood" he preferred the general subject of politics, for 
which he was well qualified, having been a Whig member 
of the Maryland legislature. He went on accordingly, 
interlarding his discourse with so much profanity that my 
father at last quietly said to him that he might be wound- 
ing the feelings of some of his auditors by the use of so 
many oaths, and asked him to desist. Instead of taking 
offense he said he recognized in my father a gentleman 
and a Christian, and that he would comply with the 
request, which he eventually tried to do but only with 
partial success. 

He then gave out that he was especially strong in 
grammar, particularly as to the pronouns, and engaged 

119 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

in a conversation with my father on the basis of his gram- 
matical knowledge, branching off to the Latin language, 
and saying he had been lying awake trying to remember 
the verb which corresponded to the word "fulmen," that 
had been like a thunderbolt in his brain. He was very 
grateful for the information which supplied his want in 
this respect. 

Once, when the train stopped, as it did several times, 
at stations where the opportunity of a bar presented itself, 
my father kindly prevented him from leaving the car for 
the purpose of refreshing himself. At another halting- 
place, however, he slipped out, my father following him 
with the benevolent intention of arresting him, if possible, 
in the execution of his intent; but the glass of liquor 
was at his lips when my father reached his side. "My 
dear friend," said the stranger, "I shall love you as long 
as I live, but you are a little too late," and he drained the 
glass. Had Joseph Jefferson been there to see him, he 
might have carried away a new touch of nature for his 
delineation of Rip Van Winkle. 

We returned from Washington toward Baltimore, as 
far as the Relay House, where we took a train for Cum- 
berland, following the windings of the Patapsco and the 
Potomac at what was then the rapid rate of twenty miles 
an hour, and through the romantic scenery in the region 
of Harper's Ferry, subsequently made memorable as the 
scene of the invasion of Virginia by John Brown. Here 
we found that the stage-coach of the "Good Intent" line, 
a small and uncomfortable vehicle, was about to leave for 

120 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

a night's journey over the Alleghanies to Brownsville on 
the Monongahela River, whence we were to be conveyed 
in a steamboat to Pittsburg, and with six fellow passengers 
were compelled to accept this method of conveyance. And 
thus, during the entire night, we made our weary way over 
the mountain range and to the banks of the Monongahela. 
From Brownsville the rest of the trip to Nashville was by 
boat, and I had my first and last experience of travel 
on the flat-bottomed steamboats which were adapted to 
the rivers of the West, and which for so many years 
formed the chief means of internal communication be- 
tween the North and the South. 

The Ohio River boats were quite palatial, and carried 
large numbers of passengers, but the boat on which we 
made our way up the Cumberland River to the capi- 
tal of the State of Tennessee, was very small. In fact, a 
very fat man who was one of the cabin passengers was 
unable to reach the promenade deck for want of sufficient 
size in the companion-way to admit of his getting through. 
From Nashville a drive of twelve miles, terminating in 
an avenue of trees, brought us to "The Hermitage," where 
we were most cordially welcomed by General Jackson and 
his family, consisting of his adopted son, Andrew Jackson, 
and the latter's wife and children. The house was a 
comparatively modern one, basing been built to replace 
the original mansion erected in 1 8 1 g and damaged by 
fire in 1836. It stood near the log cabin built by General 
Jackson when he first became the owner of the place and 
gave it the name of "The Hermitage." It was a square, 

121 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

two-story brick building, flanked by wings, with a portico 
in front and tall pillars the entire length, after the pre- 
vailing fashion of the day for country houses North and 
South. A meeting of the presbytery or synod of the neigh- 
borhood was being held in the church built by General 
Jackson on "The Hermitage" grounds, and the members 
of the convocation, clerical and lay, were arriving on horse- 
back with their saddle-bags. Everything in and about 
the house was in accordance with the usages of Southern 
plantation life, the slaves and their children forming quite 
a little community and discharging their duties in-doors 
and out-of-doors after the fashion of their race, with a 
characteristic mixture of good-nature and laziness. On 
the first morning after our arrival I marveled at the num- 
ber of women who were engaged in making my bed and 
setting my room in order. 

We found our aged host quite feeble in body, but 
mentally very bright and active. He occupied one of the 
wings of the house and did not come to the dining-room 
for his meals, but left that spacious apartment for the free 
use of his guests, a long table being set, plentifully sup- 
plied with the products of the plantation, and equal to 
the necessities of all comers at all times. The General's 
habit was to sit in a large arm-chair in one corner of the 
great fireplace of his sitting-room, on the ground floor, 
where he smoked his pipe and talked with his family and 
visitors. I think it was the very night of our arrival 
that an old clergyman named Bain, seated at the oppo- 
site side of the fireplace, in some way started as subject 

122 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

of discussion the doctrine of election, in which he de- 
clared himself a firm believer. The General listened in 
silence for some time and then taking his pipe from his 
mouth gave utterance in a decided tone to the following: 
"Brother Bain, do you mean to tell me that when my 
Saviour said 'Come unto me, all ye who labor and are 
heavy laden,' he didn't mean what he said?" Brother 
Bain was effectually silenced, and we heard no more of 
the doctrine of election that night. 

During the following day, on the porch of "The Her- 
mitage," General Jackson talked very freely of the past 
and the present. He fought over some of his battles on 
the fields of war and politics. He gave us some of the 
recollections of his earlier life, one of which I recall as 
associated with the evident sense of humor by which it 
was marked. "When I was appointed a judge," said 
the General, "I went on a circuit in a part of Tennessee 
where I had to hold court in a place where there was no 
public building, or anything over which the public had 
jurisdiction, except the village pound. Accordingly I 
determined to hold court in the pound. While sitting 
there as judge a very short constable brought in a very 
tall man, quite drunk, who had been arrested and was to 
be tried for some offense. When the subject got inside 
the pound he looked around upon the court and his officers 
with great contempt, saying 'Saul, the son of Kish, has 
come out to seek his father's asses, and lo! here they are!" 

Another story which he told with evident relish was 
a reminiscence of George Poindexter, a Mississippi sen- 

123 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

ator with whom he had a feud, and who, although he had 
been with Jackson at New Orleans, became afterward 
violently opposed to him. "Poindexter," said the Gen- 
eral, "had been making violent attacks upon me and had 
given out that the next time he met me he would demand 
satisfaction. About this time I was going from 'The Her- 
mitage' to Washington on horse-back and stopped at a 
tavern for dinner. While I was standing in the front door 
a stage-coach full of passengers came up the road, and 
stopped at the house, and whom should I see seated in 
the back seat but Poindexter. I stood on the tavern 
steps while the passengers got out of the stage to take their 
dinner. All got out but Poindexter and he remained in 
the corner of the coach, declined to get out, and was 
driven around to the stable shed while the rest of his 
companions came in and dined." 

He spoke with great feeling of his action in regard to 
Arbuthnot and Ambrister during the Seminole War in 
1818, an incident which caused great excitement and for 
which General Jackson was violently condemned in many 
quarters, though he was sustained by John Quincy Adams, 
then Secretary of State. These men were British sub- 
jects who had gone to Florida, traded with the Seminoles, 
and, according to General Jackson's belief upon the evi- 
dence furnished against them, were aiding and abetting 
the Indians in their war upon the United States. They 
were seized, tried, convicted and executed. So sure was 
he of his position that he declared, "My God would never 
have smiled upon me if I had spared those men." 

124 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

He spoke very feelingly of his relations with Henry 
Clay, his great rival and political opponent. Mr. Clay's 
course in the Seminole War debate, when he declared 
against Jackson in his speech in the House of Repre- 
sentatives in January, 1819, on the resolution condemning 
Jackson's course in the Seminole War, particularly in 
the execution of Arbuthnot and Ambrister, had greatly 
incensed General Jackson. The resolutions were voted 
down, and the result was a triumph for General Jackson, 
who left Washington soon afterward and did not return 
until his appointment to the United States Senate in 1823. 
Meanwhile he had been nominated for the presidency, 
and, there being no choice in the Electoral College, was 
one of the four candidates receiving the highest number 
of votes whose names, under the then existing provisions 
of law, came before the House of Representatives for elec- 
tion. William H. Crawford, John Ouincy Adams and 
Henry Clay were the others. General Jackson referred 
to these facts and said: 

"I was on my way to Washington to take my seat in 
the Senate of the United States, and, as we were to pass 
Clay's house on the way, I was asked if I had any ob- 
jection to calling on Mrs. Clay. I said 'No,' and added 
that I had no quarrels with ladies. As I had a very high 
respect for Mrs. Clay and her family, we stopped at the 
house, chatted for a few minutes, and then went on. 
On arriving at the inn at Eebanon I noticed a number 
of horses around the door, and who should be there but 
Clay himself and some of his friends. I alit and as I 

125 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

went up the steps he was standing by the door, and on 
seeing me extended his hand. I waved my hand, passed 
him, and entered the house. I expected that he would 
say something, but he did not; but I afterward heard that 
he complained bitterly that I should call on his wife, and 
make a friendly visit, and refuse to shake hands with him 
when I met him, but you see, sir, in that speech he had 
not only accused me of disobedience of orders, but also 
of murder. I said to my friends, 'Let us ride on/ and 
when I heard of his complaints I said, 'If Clay has any- 
thing against me let him come and say it to me, and I will 
endeavor to give him honorable satisfaction, but he need 
not be going around the country, like an old woman, 
telling stories about me.' 

"So we came to Washington, where I was asked if I 
had any objection to a reconciliation with Clay, and was 
told he would call on me if I would receive him and re- 
turn the civility. I answered that I had no desire to go 
to my grave with enmity against any man, and that I 
was ready to receive any advances of renewed intercourse 
which Clay might make. So he called and paid his re- 
spects, and I returned the visit. He dined at my house 
with Adams, and it required my interference to keep them 
from very hard words. 

"After the news of the failure of the Electoral College 
to elect a President, Clay met me on Pennsylvania Avenue, 
and, coming up in a friendly way, shook hands with me 
and said, 'General Jackson, you will go into the House of 
Representatives with a large vote and will, no doubt, be 

126 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

elected.' I drew myself up and said, 'I shall be satisfied 
if the House of Representatives in this important matter, 
regardless of any other consideration, do their duty to 
their country and to their God.' Clay bowed, we shook 
hands, he passed on and did not speak, nor have we 
spoken since." 

On Sunday there were special exercises at "The Her- 
mitage" church, and the communion service was largely 
attended by people in the neighborhood. The scene in 
the little church was very impressive. To me, as a parti- 
cipant in these simple solemnities, it was most interesting 
to see this venerable man, who had borne the storm and 
stress of conflict in battle and civil strife, who for a great 
part of his life had been idolized by vast numbers of his 
fellow countrymen, and had wielded the powers of the 
chief magistracy of the nation, now sitting in this rural 
sanctuary, side by side with my father, one of his former 
colleagues in the administration of the government, and 
attesting with bowed head and in reverent silence his be- 
lief in the verities of Christian faith. I have no more 
doubt of the sincerity of Andrew Jackson's religious con- 
victions and confessions than I have in his courage or 
patriotism. 1 And yet these unobtrusive acts of penitence 
and piety, after he had left public life for ever, did not 
escape the sneer of calumnious critics. The author of the 
disparaging biography which has found a place in the 
series of "American Statesmen" says, on the closing page 
of the book, that Jackson in his last years "joined the 

1 See Felix Grundy's letter, p. <>o ante. - Kn. 

127 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

church, and on that occasion, under the exhortations of 
his spiritual adviser, he professed to forgive all his enemies 
in a body," and adds, as the final words, that it does not 
appear that he "ever forgave an enemy as a specific indi- 
vidual." This demand for a bill of particulars to satisfy 
a Yale professor of the validity of Jackson's claim to good 
and regular standing in the Presbyterian Church is some- 
what unreasonable. Coming, as it did, a score of years 
after the General's death, it is illustrative of the persistent 
and morbid virulence of the New England anti-Jack- 
sonian spirit which always grudged to the hero of New 
Orleans the national honors which were denied to Daniel 
Webster. 

With like good-humor the General spoke of his first 
visit to New York in 1819, and of the malapropos toast 
at the public dinner given to him by the Democrats of 
that city. De Witt Clinton was at that time governor. 
He had been one of the first of the men in public life at the 
North who had taken note of General Jackson's growing 
favor with the people, and had openly declared his ad- 
miration of him, while the Democrats of his State in their 
support of William H. Crawford, of Georgia, for the 
presidency, ignored the claims of Jackson. Later on the 
New York Democrats gave their adhesion to Jackson, 
retaining, as always, their hostility to De Witt Clinton. 
New York politics, then as ever since, presented to public 
men of other States a field of exploration as intricate as 
the everglades of Florida or the jungles of the Philippines. 
Just at the time of General Jackson's visit, the "Buck- 

128 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

tails," as the Democrats of New York were called, were 
particularly hostile to the governor of their State, and 
averse to the recognition of any claims on his part to 
public confidence or favor. 

"How could I know anything about their politics?' 
said the General. "I knew that De Witt Clinton was 
governor of the State and so at the dinner when it came 
my turn to speak I gave as a toast 'De Witt Clinton — to 
be great is to be envied.' To my surprise it was received 
in silence." He then went on to describe his astonish- 
ment at the silence with which his toast was received, 
and at the disgust of the Bucktail hosts because of the 
blunder he had committed. In telling the story, he gave 
the language of the toast precisely as I have repeated it, 
and as I jotted it down at the time in the notes I kept 
of his reminiscences given in my hearing at "The Her- 
mitage." Strangely enough, he was in error himself in 
his recollection, for the toast as actually given was, 
"De Witt Clinton, Governor of the Great and Patri- 
otic State of New York." This I have on the evi- 
dence of two of the guests present at the dinner, Fitz- 
Greene Halleck and Charles P. Clinch. Mr. Clinch, 
who was for many years a deputy collector of New 
York, gave me the facts in conversation and Halleck by 
letter. 

In a biographical sketch of Mr. Van Buren published 
just after his death, I referred to this incident, and quoted 
General Jackson's toast just as repeated by him. Hal- 
leck wrote me as follows: 

129 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

"Guilford, Connecticut, Sept. 10, '62. 
Dear Sir, 

You doubtless recollect that after the success of "Tom 
Jones" its author undertook an historical work, and that 
Lady Mary Montagu in allusion to it, said, "What a pity 
that my cousin, Mr. Fielding, should have abandoned 
writing Truth, and taken to writing History !' ; 

I find, in the Home Journal of this week, not having 
yet had the pleasure of seeing the volume, an extract from 
your "Sketch" of Mr. Van Buren, in which mention is 
made of the Toast given by General Jackson at a dinner 
in Tammany Hall in March, 18 19. A reference to the 
newspapers of the time, not in my power here, will, I 
think, prove that you have been misinformed as to the 
exact words of the Toast. I was present on the occasion, 
and, as I remember them they were "De Witt Clinton, the 
Governor of the great and patriotic State of New York" 
embracing, very gracefully, a double compliment, and a 
rebuke, or not, at the pleasure of the listeners. 

The belief that your good taste will deem my version 
the most in accordance with that sense of propriety which 
was a characteristic, alike of Mr. Van Buren, and General 
Jackson, induces me to hope that you will pardon the 
liberty I have taken in thus addressing you. 
Believe me, dear sir, 

Truly yours, 

Fitz-Greene Halleck. 
Wm. Allen Butler, Esq. 

This was followed within a few days and before my 
receipt of the first letter by another: 

„ _ Guilford, Connecticut, Sept. 20. '62. 

Dear Sir: 

Since I had the pleasure of writing you, conscience 

compels me to admit that while professing to be the only 

immaculate Historian extant, I have myself become a fit 

subject for Lady Mary's sportive wit. For I now find, 

in a work of authority, near me, that the dinner alluded to 

130 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

did not take place in March, but on the 23d of the pre- 
ceding February. 

I have read somewhere that Mr. Webster and Mr. 
Choate once entered into a Bet as to a line of Pope. On 
referring to a volume which contained it, Mr. Webster 
appeared to be in the wrong, but he, with clever adroit- 
ness, successfully challenged Mr. Choate to prove that the 
volume before them was not a spurious Edition, and won 
his Bet accordingly. So, in my case, I pleasantly presume, 
that should the newspapers, I referred you to, prove my 
version correct, your legal acuteness will cause me to be 
non-suited with costs, on the ground of the proverbial 
mendacity of all newspaper Reporting. 

I can scarcely hope to be pardoned for trifling, as I am 
now doing, with time so constantly and so usefully occu- 
pied as yours, but it is a cheerful relief to turn, for a mo- 
ment, from our gloomy present and doubtful future to the 
brighter and the better Past, and to even the slightest 
traits of character in the great and wise which having your 
very interesting sketch of the past recalls to our memory. 

Believe me dear sir, 

Truly yours, 

Fitz-Greene Halleck. 
Wm. Allen Butler, Esq. 

I replied to both of the above letters as follows: 

Trinity Building, New York, Sept. 23d. '62. 
My Dear Mr. Halleck, 

Your note of the 10th, inst. would have been answered 
before but for my absence from the city. On my return 
this morning, I find myself doubly in your debt by your 
added favor of the 20th. Please accept my thanks for 
both. I am truly gratified that my little venture in bi- 
ography has succeeded so far as to elicit your friendly 
criticism and comment. I send the book by mail. As it 
was originally a newspaper article, all the presumptions 
are, of course, against its veracity, but as to the point in 
which you impeach it I can vindicate its truthfulness. 

131 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

You will notice that I profess to tell the tale about the 
Tammany toast as it was told to me. If I was misin- 
formed, it was by General Jackson himself. When my 
Father and I were at the Hermitage, in April 1844, he 
gave us this with many other reminiscences, and then re- 
peated the toast as I have stated it. I made memoranda 
of these conversations at the time, which are now before 
me, and in which the toast is recorded as I have printed it. 
When I wrote the sketch of Mr. Van Buren I looked up 
the record in Parton's life of Jackson, and there found 
the toast substantially as you have given it. I thought of 
adding a note to justify and explain the discrepancy, but 
I dislike notes and finally acted upon the principle, for 
which I may fairly cite you as the latest authority, that in 
no case is the Historian to be believed. I confess that I 
did not imagine that any one who was present at the din- 
ner would have the courage at this distance of time to 
avow it; but if I had thought of you, who have made 
yourself immortal, I should have made you an exception. 
Nullum tempus occurrit regi. 

Now, my dear sir, I think you will admit that I have 
fairly raised a question of veracity between you and Gen- 
eral Jackson and there I will leave it trusting that the 
"mighty Hector's shade" will not invade your slumbers 
with a demand for satisfaction. 

Yours truly, 

Wm. Allen Butler. 

A final letter from Halleck closed the correspond- 
ence. 

Guilford, Connecticut, Sept. 24 '62. 

My Dear Sir, 

I am very grateful for the kind present this moment 
received with your letter of yesterday. 

I can well understand and, in doing so, can reconcile 
all conflicting differences, that the General in familiar 
conversation with you, expressed emphatically the senti- 
ment intended to be conveyed in the Toast, without re- 

132 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

calling or considering important, its exact words. Let 
us, therefore, leave them as a mythical theme for the 
Niebuhrs of the hereafter. 

Should you think it worth your while to look at the 
Bradford Club Volume of Croakers, you will find on page 
5 a pleasant account of the dinner from the pen of Dr. 
Drake, my companion at the table. To him and me who 
were, politically, indifferent spectators and on the lookout 
for subjects of merriment, the scene was delightfully 
amusing. 

So sudden a transition from the most enthusiastic 
Hero-worship on the part of many near us, to the bitter 
words and more bitter silence of iconoclastic fury, has 
been seldom witnessed. 

Fortunately the General outlived their indignation 

and so did they. 

Believe me, dear sir 

Yours truly, 

u 7 . r, -~ Fitz-Greene Halleck. 

VVm. Allen Butler, Esq. 

I have rapidly glanced over the Memoir and fancy 
that I can rightly name one of the persons alluded to on 
page 35, Jean Jacques Rousseau, not the only forgetful 
witness of genius, whose style like Othello's pocket hand- 
kerchief " had magic in the web of it." 

A more famous toast, but one equally startling, was 
that given by General Jackson, April 13, 1830, at a 
dinner in Washington on the anniversary of Jefferson's 
birth. It was said that this was to be a nullification dem- 
onstration. Calhoun, the leader of the so-called nulli- 
fiers, was present, and was to make a speech in support 
of States' Rights. Jackson, who was in the second year 
of his presidency, saw the danger, and rising to his feet 
shattered the masked batteries of the banqueters by a 

too 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

single fatal shot. He gave as a toast "Our Federal 
Union: It Must Be Preserved. " This was at once a 
political platform, a campaign document and a declara- 
tion of war. Nullification, the name given to the at- 
tempted resistance of the State of South Carolina against 
the Federal authority, received its death-blow at that 
banquet. Calhoun, who was the next speaker, vainly at- 
tempted a rescue by the toast "The Union: Next to 
our Liberty the most dear: may we all remember that it 
can only be preserved by respecting the rights of the 
States and distributing equally the benefit and burden of 
the Union." 

Nullification thus became a dead issue; and General 
Jackson told us at "The Hermitage," among many other 
things, that if Calhoun had persevered in the disorganiz- 
ing and rebellious proceedings set on foot by him in South 
Carolina, he would have hanged him. 

The General recalled his first impressions of Mr. Van 
Buren, who was a senator when General Jackson came 
to that body from Tennessee. "I had heard," he said, 
"of Mr. Van Buren's non-committalism, and I decided to 
make up my mind as to that on the first opportunity. An 
important question came before the Senate, and while it 
was being discussed by other senators I saw that Mr. Van 
Buren was taking notes and evidently meant to take 
part in the debate. So I made it a point to be in my 
seat when he came to speak. He made a very clear and 
able speech and when he had finished I turned around to 
my colleague, Major Eaton, who was sitting by me, and 

134 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

said to him, 'Major, was there anything non-committal 
about that?' 'No, sir,' said he." 

The most interesting memento of General Jackson in 
my possession is a letter written, while President, in his 
strong, bold handwriting to a young man in whom he 
took a deep and almost paternal interest, but who, up to 
the date of the letter, had been less studious than he had 
hoped. The letter exhibits qualities very characteristic 
of the writer and evinces a spirit of tender sympathy and 
affection so much at variance with the ideas which many 
were led to form of General Jackson by what was written 
and said about him during his public life, that I include it 
in my reminiscences of him, reproducing it exactly as it 
was written, without correcting the two or three errors in 
spelling which will be found in it, not very serious for 
those days. 

Washington, June 13, 1829. 
My dear H 

I have just received your affectionate letter of the 25th, 
ultimo and hasten to answer it. 

I am pleased to find that you are determined to adopt 
and follow my advice. I gave it with the feelings of a 
father and I am sure it will bring you into life happily and 
be the means of carrying you through life with respect- 
ability an honor. 

I have a great wish that you should go to Mr. Otte, 
because I know him to be a religious, moral and honest 
man, capable of teaching you those branches that I have 
recommended to your study and a man who will guard 
your morals both by precept and example. But as you 
appear to have such unwillingness to go to Mr. Otte and 
has chosen Mr. Wellsford as your teacher should you 
not have secured Mr. Otte before this reaches you I yield 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

my consent that you may go to Mr. Wellsford but if you 
have entered with Mr. Otte, you must on no account leave 
him before your session terminates. 

If you should, having been suspended from college, 
you never can regain your character and now is the time 
for you to obtain an education, which if you neglect, the 
day will come when you will sincerely regret your present 
mispent time. In a few years, you will be of age and 
without an education, unless you attend better to your 
learning than you have heretofore. I must again im- 
press upon your mind the greatness of an education, 
and urge you for your own benefit, to great application in 
your studies so that you may at least be a good mathe- 
matician, as well as master of arithmetic, and that you 
learn to write a good hand and become well acquainted 
with orthography, in which I find that you are at present, 
very deficient. 

When I review the great expense I have been at to 
give you an education, how many admonitions I have be- 
stowed upon you, urging you to proper industry in your 
studies and application to your book, and now find you 
approaching to manhood without an education, having 
spent your time in idleness and folly, the tear trickles down 
my cheek and I supplicate my God that he may [guide] and 
direct you better for the future and console myself with the 
[promise] in your letter now before me, that my advice 
will be followed by you for the future — if it is, I freely 
pardon what is past, and will foster, and cherish for you 
in my boosom, those parental feelings that I have always 
had, and will bring you on here so soon as I find you 
have laid the foundation of a good education where you 
now are, where you can spend with me a few months, and 
become acquainted with your grand uncle Judge Smith 
now in the Senate of the U. States. 

Write to me on the receipt of this informing me where 
you are, and the studies that you are engaged in and in- 
form General Coffee who will furnish the funds to pay 
your board, schooling and clothing. 

Andrew and Samuel, send their respects to you, in 

136 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

which Capt. A. J. Donelson, Emily and Mary Easton 
unite with Major Lewis. Your cousin Andrew has written 
to you some time since, you must write to him often as 
well as to me. 

Give my respects to Thomas J. Donelson and Mr. 
Steel and to all my friends in the neighborhood of The 
Hermitage. Tell the negroes all howde for me that I 
am glad to hear that they are well treated, and happy, that 
I wish them all to behave well and they shall be well 
treated and that I supplicate a throne of grace for them. 
I wish you to write me often, follow my advice and believe 
me yr affectionate father and friend. 

Andrew Jackson. 

In regard to political affairs we found General Jack- 
son, in spite of the feebleness of his body, not infirm of 
will or purpose. He was ardent for the nomination of 
Van Buren for the presidency and for that of his friend 
and neighbor, James K. Polk, for Vice-President, and ar- 
dent also for the annexation of Texas to the United States. 
As to both nominations my father agreed with his views. 
Mr. Polk, as Speaker of the House of Representatives, 
had acquired a national reputation and was a man of high 
personal character. But the question of the annexation of 
Texas was one of serious difficulty. To deal with Texas 
as an independent sovereignty and to bring her into the 
Union by treaty, or other means, meant a conflict of 
opinion among our own citizens and a possible war with 
Mexico. In fact after the annexation there was actual 
war. Mr. Clay, who was generally expected to be named 
as the Whig candidate for the presidency, had not spoken 
on the subject nor had the presumptive candidate of the 

'37 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Democracy, Mr. Van Buren, declared his views. Dur- 
ing the period of suspense as to the open attitude which 
the two rival party chiefs would take on this momentous 
question, the Southern Democrats were violent in their 
efforts to secure the addition of the "Lone Star" State to 
the constellation of the Union, and to make immediate 
annexation a leading issue of the presidential campaign. 
By a coincidence, or as some think, the result of a mutual 
understanding between Mr. Clay and Mr. Van Buren, 
they published their views as to the annexation of Texas 
about the same time: Mr. Clay in the National In- 
telligencer, of Washington, April 17, 1844, within a few 
days after the appearance of a letter by Mr. Van Buren 
in the Globe of the same city. Both declared against the 
annexation of Texas as unwise and inexpedient, but neither 
placed his opposition on the ground of the vast accession 
to the slave power which would result by the incorporat- 
ing of Texas within our domain. To the southern slave- 
holders the acquisition of Texas meant the strengthening 
of the system of slavery and the consolidation of its 
forces for resistance against attack and for aggressive ad- 
vance, if need be, into new territory. 

Even in the quiet and peaceful domestic circle of "The 
Hermitage " the dark shadow of slavery cast its baleful 
gloom. Mrs. Andrew Jackson, Jr., the wife of the ex- 
President's adopted son, was a devoted Christian woman, 
desirous of teaching and training the slave children on 
the plantation and in every possible way improving their 
condition. The laws of Tennessee forbade the giving of 

138 



A RETROSPFXT OF FORTY YEARS 

instruction to slaves or teaching their children to read or 
write. This she felt to be a cruel hardship, and bitterly 
complained that her hands were tied so as to prevent her 
from leading these poor children along the path of intelli- 
gence and education. She, of all the women in Tennes- 
see, was bound to obey the law which kept not only her 
slaves but herself in bondage. 

[Another interesting memento of this visit to "The 
Hermitage," and of the friendship existing between Gen- 
eral Jackson and my grandfather, is a lock of the former's 
hair found amongst my father's papers. 

This lock of straight, soft, grey hair is still in its origi- 
nal wrapper of brown paper inscribed " General Jackson's 
hair, presented to Mr. Butler of New York. Hermitage, 
April, 23d, 1844." — Ed.] 



U9 



CHAPTER X 

RETURN TRIP TO WASHINGTON — MAMMOTH CAVE — PRESIDENTIAL CAM- 
PAIGN OF 1844 — DEFEAT OF VAN BUREN — EXPLOSION ON THE "PRINCE- 
TON" — SILAS WRIGHT — SECRETARYSHIP OF WAR OFFERED TO BEN- 
JAMIN F. BUTLER — HIS REFUSAL AND HIS RESUMPTION OF THE DISTRICT 
ATTORNEYSHIP IN NEW YORK — GEORGE BANCROFT. 

BRINGING our visit to a close we came by stage-coach 
to Nashville, to Frankfort and Lexington, stopping 
on our way at Bell's Tavern to visit the Mammoth Cave, 
six miles distant therefrom. We spent a day in the cave, 
penetrating nine miles from the entrance and exploring 
it in every accessible part. While it is far more impressive 
and interesting than the famous cave of Adelsberg in 
Austria, which I visited some years later, for some reason 
it has never attracted the public to the extent of its Eu- 
ropean rival. Bell, who kept the tavern where we stopped, 
had never had the curiosity to go to the cave. He could 
do that any day and consequently had never done it. 

Early on the morning of the 2d or 3d of May we 
stopped at a little inland Pennsylvania settlement and 
were greeted by a crowd, small in numbers but greatly ex- 
cited in its enthusiasm over the Whig nominations for 
President and Vice-President, which had been made by 
the convention held in Baltimore on May 1. There 
were vociferous hurrahs for Henry Clay and his asso- 
ciate on the ticket with whose long name, probably never 

140 



A RETROSPECT OE FORTY YEARS 

heard of before, the enthusiasts were making the air 
vocal. Greatly surprised, I found it to be that of our 
near neighbor and my venerated preceptor, Theodore 
Frelinghuysen, chancellor of the New York University. 
He was one of the most serious-minded, sober-visaged and 
decorously-behaved of living men, and I wondered what 
would have been his feelings could he have heard the most 
exuberant and least sober of his admirers announcing 
for my information that this " Fre-lin-guy-sen is a bird 
of a fellow!" 

It was just in the interval of time between our return 
home from " The Hermitage " and the assembling of the 
National Democratic Convention at Baltimore on May 27, 
1844, that the conspiracy of the Southern leaders for the 
annexation of Texas and for the defeat of Mr. Van Buren 
for the presidential nomination, on the pretext of his op- 
position to annexation, came to its culminating point. 
Conspirators work in the dark, and it is difficult to prove 
their dealings. In a series of letters, written by Silas 
Wright, from his seat in the Senate Chamber, to my fa- 
ther between May 15 and June 3, 1844, under the strictest 
seal of confidence, and which have therefore never been 
published, I have very conclusive and interesting evidence 
of the development of the plans to destroy Mr. Van Buren's 
candidacy, notwithstanding the fact that a majority of the 
delegates to the convention had been instructed, and were 
pledged, to vote for him. 

The situation at this time in regard to Texas was the 
result of a long series of intrigues on the part of the South- 

141 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

ern leaders. Texas was a part of Mexico, but it lay in 
dangerous proximity to the Southern States; and, although 
slavery was prohibited by the Mexican law, emigrants 
from the United States had poured into the territory with 
their slaves, resisted the Mexican authority, and revolted 
against the rule of Santa Anna; then, after winning a 
decisive victory under the leadership of General Sam 
Houston, they had established their independence as the 
State of Texas and had been recognized as an inde- 
pendent government by the United States in 1837, and 
not long afterward by England, France and Belgium. 

The idea of annexing Texas to the United States was 
in the air soon after the new republic had been organized, 
but public opinion at the North, represented by both the 
Whig and Democratic parties, gave it no favor. To 
annex Texas would mean that a vast area would be added 
to the slave-holding South, but up to 1843, there was no 
definite movement on the part of the slave-holders of the 
South to bring the coveted domain within the bounds of 
the United States. On the death of President Harrison 
in April, 1841, John Tyler succeeded to the presidency, 
threw off the allegiance to the Whig party by which he 
had been elected to the second place on the ticket, cast 
in his lot with the Democrats, and made it the chief ob- 
ject of his ambition to secure the annexation of Texas. 
Mr. Webster, who had openly declared his opposition to 
the scheme, retired from the Cabinet, in which he had 
filled the office of Secretary of State, and was succeeded 
by Abel P. Upshur, of Virginia, an ardent friend of an- 

142 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

nexation, and an earnest coadjutor with Tyler in his 
efforts to bring about the desired result. 

On February 28, 1844, while tne President and mem- 
bers of the Cabinet were visiting the United States man- 
of-war Princeton, a new gun called "The Peacemaker," 
was tested, with the result that a terrific explosion oc- 
curred, by which a number of persons were killed, includ- 
ing the Secretary of State. Within a week after this dis- 
tressing accident, as it would appear by the evidence of 
Henry A. Wise, a leading Virginia Democrat, and by his 
persuasion, the President called into the Cabinet, as Sec- 
retary of State, the most extreme and rabid advocate of 
slavery and slavery extension, John C. Calhoun, mainly 
for the purpose of hastening the cherished project of 
annexation. Calhoun acted with such rapidity that on 
April 12, 1844, a treaty of annexation was signed between 
Texas and the President of the United States, and on April 
22 it was sent to the Senate. The secrecy and celerity 
with which all this had been accomplished had given the 
North no time or opportunity for comprehending the 
nature of the movement. As both Mr. Clay and Mr. Van 
Buren, on grounds of broad statesmanship, had declared 
against the policy of annexation, the two great political 
parties, of which they were the respective leaders, had 
hitherto stood aloof from a course which threatened to 
embroil the United States in a war with a friendly power, 
and the Senate eventually rejected the treaty by the 
decisive vote of thirty-five to sixteen. 

It was while these machinations were in progress and 

143 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

the treaty was before the Senate that Mr. Wright began 
the series of letters to my father alluded to above. Mr. 
Wright was surrounded by Democrats who had come to 
Washington on the eve of the convention, and whose chief 
aim was to compass the defeat of Mr. Van Buren as the 
Democratic candidate. Mr. Wright had been in the 
Senate for eleven years. No man had greater influence 
in that body or was more highly respected than he. He 
looked with the greatest alarm upon the project of an- 
nexing Texas, and his keen and sagacious foresight re- 
vealed to him the consequences which would follow the 
success of the intrigue going on about him. 

The real issue of the presidential election of 1844 was 
the annexation of Texas. Mr. Polk had declared himself 
unconditionally in favor of it, the South accepted his un- 
equivocal declaration in preference to the vacillating out- 
givings of Clay, and from the moment of the unexpected 
nomination of Polk the result of the presidential canvass 
was unquestionable. Mr. Clay had spoken against an- 
nexation, and although he made two efforts to explain his 
letters so as to satisfy the slave-holding element in the 
South, this only proved a venture, as Carl Schurz says, 
"upon that most perilous of manoeuvres on the political 
as well as the military field — a change of front under the 
fire of the enemy." Mr. Van Buren and his friends stood 
by Polk at the polls. 

To ensure united Democratic support in New York 
and to soothe the wounded feelings of the disappointed 
friends of Mr. Van Buren, Silas Wright was prevailed 

144 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

upon to accept the nomination for governor. Contrary to 
his wishes and actuated solely by a sense of duty to the 
Democracy of the State he led the ticket for the gover- 
norship and carried the State for Polk and Dallas. The 
office of governor was distasteful to him, and he was bit- 
terly disappointed at the outcome of all his services and 
sacrifices in the interest of the party. After serving out a 
single term as governor, and meeting defeat in his canvass 
for re-election, he retired to his country home at Canton, 
St. Lawrence County, where he died August 27, 1847. 

After the election of Polk, President Tyler in his last 
annual message proclaimed that the verdict of the Ameri- 
can people at the election in November was in favor of 
immediate annexation, and, in order to accomplish it as 
the crowning act of his administration, he used every effort 
to secure the result by a joint resolution of Congress, which, 
after long debate and several amendments, became a law 
and was signed by him as President. It authorized him 
to submit to Texas a proposition of annexation upon 
condition that slavery should be prohibited in all territory 
lying north of 36 30' north latitude, and acting on this 
authority, in the last days of his term he dispatched 
special envoys to Texas. Tyler obtained assent to the 
condition, and annexation was thus practically ac- 
complished before the President-elect took the oath of 
office. 

I think the hand of Robert J. Walker was in all this. 
A few days after the nomination he wrote to my father 
from Washington referring to Mr. Van Buren in most 

'45 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

exalted terms and saying: "Now that he is withdrawn I 
may say to you that the sense of public duty which com- 
pelled me to oppose his renomination gave me greater 
pain than any preceding act of my life." I suppose that 
no more repugnant tax can be levied upon human credulity 
than when a politician asks his former associates, whom 
he has deserted and betrayed, to believe that it was at the 
call of duty. Probably the same high sense of duty re- 
quired him to advise Mr. Polk to put off New York with 
an offer of a place in the Cabinet which could hardly fail 
to be declined. In a letter to my father dated November 
25, 1845, Mr. Polk writes: "The vote of New York was 
indispensable to our success. With her vote we could 
have lost several of the smaller States and still have car- 
ried the election; but without her vote we must have been 
defeated. . . . Mr. Van Buren and his friends, I am 
fully satisfied, have acted a magnanimous and noble 
part." With these assurances it was not unreasonable 
that those to whom they were addressed should have sup- 
posed that the chief place in the Cabinet of the newly- 
elected President would go to New York. But after he 
reached Washington he wrote my father again under 
date of February 25, 1845, as follows: "For reasons 
which are satisfactory to myself I have determined to 
look to the State of New York for my Secretary of War. 
Among all her eminent citizens I have selected yourself in 
preference to any other for that office and now tender it 
to you." Following this with the warmest expressions 
of regard, he said, among other things, "I most sincerely 

146 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

hope that you will not hesitate to accept this office," 
and signed himself, "Most sincerely your friend." 

My father promptly declined the President's offer, al- 
though urged by some of the other close friends of Mr. 
Van Buren to accept it in order to avoid the risk of Mr. 
Polk's giving the place to one of the leaders of a portion 
of the New York Democracy, who had grown jealous of 
the ascendency of Mr. Van Buren and his friends in the 
Democratic party and were now working in hostility to 
them. Prominent among these disaffected Democrats 
was William L. Marcy, a former Supreme Court judge 
and governor of New York, for many years closely allied 
with Mr. Van Buren, and the author, while in Congress, 
of the familiar phrase, " To the victor belong the spoils 
of the enemy." To the younger men around Mr. Van 
Buren it seemed indispensable that his interests, which 
they deemed identical with those of the party in New 
York, should have a representative in the Cabinet. Sam- 
uel J. Tilden, who was one of these, went to Washington 
to confer with Mr. Polk, and, if possible, avert the appre- 
hended danger of his selecting a member of the Cabinet 
from the wrong wing of the party. In a long letter writ- 
ten from Washington, March i, 1845, Mr. Tilden gave a 
graphic description of his interview with Mr. Polk and 
of the hitter's warm expressions of friendship for my 
father and of regret at his declining to become a member 
of the Cabinet; but evidently the result of the interview 
did not encourage him to hope that anything, beyond the 
offer then made, would be done in the way of satisfying the 

•47 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

expectations of Mr. Van Buren and his friends. In fact, 
Mr. Tilden had hardly returned to New York from his 
fruitless mission when we heard that Governor Marcy 
was on his way to Washington to take the place of Secre- 
tary of War in the new Cabinet. From the circumstances 
I have thus related, I think it was always supposed by 
the immediate friends of Mr. Van Buren that Mr. Polk's 
course in the matter was treacherous; that the offer he 
made to my father was with the full expectation that it 
would be refused ; that his turning away from New York 
for a Secretary of State, and giving that office to James 
Buchanan of Pennsylvania, was to strengthen his alliance 
with that portion of the party which was represented by 
Robert J. Walker, whom he made Secretary of the Treas- 
ury, as well as to rid himself of his obligations to his 
political supporters in New York. 

While I think Mr. Polk, in the course he pursued tow- 
ard New York, was greatly blamable, I cannot regard 
his professions of friendship to my father as wholly in- 
sincere. The latter was the one man whom the President 
wanted in his Cabinet from New York. He told Mr. Til- 
den, in the letter to which I have referred, that he regarded 
the Texas question as settled, Congress having brought 
that State into the Union, and he was sanguine that his 
administration would deserve the confidence and support 
of the Democracy of New York. But he yielded at the 
very outset to the demand of that portion of the party 
which had elected him and which the slave power was 
gradually enfolding in its fatal grasp. That the Presi- 

148 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

dent's regard for my father continued, notwithstanding 
his refusal to enter the Cabinet, is shown by the fact that 
in the early days of March, 1845, he asked him to resume 
the office of United States District Attorney in New 
York. This my father did. 

The appointment of George Bancroft, the historian, as 
Secretary of the Navy, was intended by Mr. Polk as evi- 
dence of his continued friendship with the immediate sup- 
porters of Mr. Van Buren. Bancroft had made a gal- 
lant though unsuccessful struggle for the governorship 
of Massachusetts. He had no special qualifications for 
the office he was called upon to fill in Washington, but as 
he was impulsive and sanguine in temperament, and 
quite anxious for political distinction, he did not hesitate 
to enter into close relations with Mr. Polk, and he favored 
a plan, which received some support from Mr. Van 
Buren's friends, that the ex-President should go as Min- 
ister to England, which Mr. Polk thought would be a 
very desirable thing. Mr. Bancroft wrote my father, "It 
is really a matter of public moment (and I think private 
comfort) for Mr. Van Buren to go to England. I do not 
think we are in great danger of a war but Mr. V. B.'s 
presence would indicate the love of peace. By going he 
makes himself a public benefactor." Mr. Van Buren 
thought otherwise and the plan fell through. The mission 
to England, afterward, came to Mr. Bancroft himself, 
and I think he found it a source of much private comfort 
as it was of public benefit and a happy deliverance from 
the routine work of the Navy Department. 

149 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

I have devoted much space, perhaps too much, to the 
history of the intrigues connected with the schemes of 
the Southern leaders for the defeat of Mr. Van Buren 
and the annexation of Texas. I have thought, however, 
that this chapter of our political history, from fresh and 
undoubted sources, would not be without a special in- 
terest of its own, especially in view of the fact that this 
successful plot, with its inevitable consequence of the war 
with Mexico and the acquisition of the new Territories, 
gained as the fruit of our victories, became the chief 
means of the final overthrow and destruction of slavery 
and the slave power. 



150 



CHAPTER XI 

ADMISSION TO THE BAR — VOYAGE TO EUROPE — "THE WANDERER" — 
ENTERTAINED AT CAEN — PARIS OF 1846 — "VAUCLUSE" — THE YOUNG 
ENGLISHMAN AND THE QUEEN'S ENGLISH — TRIP TO GENOA AND NAPLES 
— ASCENT OF VESUVIUS — HOTEL AT POMPEn — THE LANDLORD'S ENG- 
LISH — TRD? TO SICILY — ROME — POPE PIUS DC — LEPRl's RESORT OF 
AMERICANS — POWERS'S "GREEK SLAVE" — TITIAN'S "ASSUMPTION" — 
FLORENCE — VENICE — LETTER HOME — BERLttf — BARON VON HUMBOLDT. 

WAS admitted to the bar July 10, 1846, at a sitting of 
A the Supreme Court in Utica. As the Constitution of 
the State then stood I could be licensed only as an "at- 
torney," the degree of "Counsellor-at-Law" requiring 
three years' previous service as attorney. But by an 
amendment made by the Convention of 1846 the distinc- 
tion between attorneys and counsellors was abolished 
and a single examination and license sufficed for the ac- 
quirement of both titles. 

On July 16, I sailed for Europe in the packet-ship 
Havre, for the port of that name, Captain Ainsworth in 
command, to be absent a year and five months. This 
European trip was the result of the kind and persistent 
persuasion of my classmate and close friend, George L. 
Duyckinck, who wished to carry out a long-cherished plan 
of European travel, which he declared he would not exe- 
cute without my companionship. Yielding to this friendly 
compulsion, I occupied the interval between the end of 
my clerkship in my father's office and the beginning of 

I 5 I 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

my practice as an attorney, in what was for those days 
a very extended tour in Europe. Captain Ainsworth de- 
clared the Havre to be the fastest sailing-sloop in the 
world. She had made the trip from New York to Havre 
in fourteen days and twelve hours, and with a good breeze 
had sailed in a single day three hundred and eight miles. 
She could make twelve or thirteen knots an hour. Our 
midsummer trip was not, however, a record-breaker, and 
our passage consumed twenty-four days. 

The zest of travel belongs especially to youth. Shake- 
speare says "Home-keeping youth have ever homely wits," 
and certainly nothing so broadens the mind or expands 
the intellect as intelligent observation of men and things 
the world over. To turn a studious, thoughtful and ob- 
serving young man into a traveler is to furnish him the in- 
formation of an encyclopaedia without the need of scanning 
any pages except those of his guide-book. Every faculty 
of his being comes to his aid, the will, the imagination, the 
courage that defies danger, the perseverance that insures 
success, and the satisfaction of rest after toil; and even 
though the eye is not satisfied with seeing and the ear 
with hearing, the uses and memories of travel are among 
the best possessions of later life. How often, in those re- 
mote days, before Europe became a network of railroads, 
youthful wanderers, crossing on foot some mountain pass 
with knapsack on back and alpenstock in hand, stepped 
aside while the lumbering diligence, overcrowded by com- 
monplace passengers, passed them on its creaking way; 
or the well-appointed traveling carriage dashed by — pos- 

J 52 



A RETROSPECT OE EORTY YEARS 

tilions cracking their whips, my lord and lady lolling 
inside, and the all-important courier and scarcely less im- 
portant lady's-maid in the rumble — all casting looks of 
pity, perhaps of scorn, on the pedestrians. At the end 
of the day's journey, however, when our belated pedes- 
trians trudged into the inn, where the occupants of the 
lumbering diligence and the well-appointed travelling car- 
riage were either finishing the evening meal at the table 
d'hote or monopolizing all the possibilities of luxury the 
hostelry could furnish, they satisfied their appetites with 
a keener relish and enjoyed their night's rest with a 
sounder sleep than all the others. 

[Not only to my father's youth did this zest of travel 
belong, but to every period of his life. All journeyings, 
whether brief or lengthy, brought him keen enjoyment, 
making it a delight to travel with him. 

A little poem written about this time is as indicative 
of his feelings in later life as of his earlier sensations. — Ed.] 

THE WANDERER 

O rare delight of seeing, 

O joy unchecked of being 
Abroad and free, in this wide world of ours! 

Such pleasure the birds have, 

Winging o'er wood and wave, 
O'er meadows bright with dew, bright with perpetual flowers. 

Still fares the wanderer forth, 

And still the exhaustless Earth 
With all her treasures greets her wayward child; 

For him, on all her shores, 

She spreads her countless stores, 
In sunlit beauty strewn, or solemn grandeur piled. 

153 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

The plain at early light; 

At noon, the mountain height; 
At eve, the valley, with its shadows deep; 

At night, the cataract, 

Or ocean's boundless tract, 
With ceaseless rush of waves, or murmurs soft as sleep. 

To-day, the crowded mart, 

The sacred shrines of art, 
The domes of empire, the cathedral vast; 

To-morrow, the wild woods, 

Or desert solitudes, 
With shattered temples strewn and fragments of the past. 

Tempt not my feet to stay, 

Along the upward way, 
Across the earth, across the sparkling sea, 

Beyond the distant isles, 

The far horizon smiles, 
And where its voices call, thither my steps must be! 

On our embarkation from New York, my friend, 
Theodore Sedgwick, an eminent son of the eminent jurist 
of that name, introduced me on the deck of the Havre 
to a French lady, who had been passing some time in the 
United States and was returning to her home in Caen, an 
ancient city of Normandy, the burial place of William the 
Conqueror. She was the sister of the Procureur du Roi, 
of the Department of Calcados, and was a most intelligent 
traveling companion. Before we reached Havre she had 
engaged us to visit her family, at her home. Accordingly, 
soon after our arrival, we found ourselves enjoying the 
hospitality of Caen on a most liberal scale. 

It was a piece of rare good fortune that immediately 

154 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

after setting foot on the soil of France we had the oppor- 
tunity of being welcomed into the home circle of a charm- 
ing provincial family that was a center of influence. We 
found that the Procureur, who devoted himself to us and 
showed us the public institutions of Caen, was everywhere 
received with visible tokens of respect. After spending 
two delightful days in the old city, supplemented by some 
walks in Normandy and a visit to Mont San Michel, we 
made our way to Paris. 

The Paris of 1846, in the sober reign of Louis Philippe, 
"King of the French," as he styled himself, although not 
what it became under the Second Empire and the recon- 
structive sway of Baron Haussmann, was, nevertheless, 
in grandeur and gayety, the capital of the world. All 
the old historic landmarks were still there; the treasures 
of art in the galleries of the Louvre, and the incompar- 
able facade of the Tuileries with all its souvenirs of royalty. 
At one of the tower windows of this palace I saw the little 
Comte de Paris held up for the admiring gaze of the out- 
side public when he was only a few months old, the pre- 
sumptive heir of the throne of France, which he was des- 
tined never to gain. 

In Paris I made the acquaintance of Theodore Met- 
calf, of Boston, a son of Judge Theron Metcalf, of the 
Supreme Court of Massachusetts. Being like Duyckinck 
and myself foot-free as a traveler, he cast in his lot with 
us, and we formed a party just filling the coupe of the 
diligence, the most desirable compartment of that lumber- 
ing public conveyance. 

155 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

We traversed southern France, lingering at Vaucluse, 
Rheims, Aries, Avignon, and Marseilles; and going thence 
by steamer to Toulon, made our way along the Cornici 
road between the mountains and the sea to Genoa. 

[During this foreign tour my father wrote a series of 
letters, still extant, to different members of his family at 
home. These letters, combined with his note-books, would 
of themselves form a volume of no small size and of no 
little interest. 

There is in them not only the buoyancy of youth, but 
the philosophy of a mind unusually mature. Touched also 
with a merry wit, they produced a result eagerly antici- 
pated by those to whom they were addressed. 

The temptation to introduce extended extracts from 
these letters into the brief sketch of his trip as found in 
these reminiscences has been almost irresistible. As, 
however, this might give undue prominence to a mere epi- 
sode of travel, only a few notes have been selected, bear- 
ing upon those moments when enthusiasm found expres- 
sion in "simple strains where truth and passion meet," 
even as he described in these words the "melodious 
breathings" of his then favorite poet Uhland. 1 

At Vaucluse the combined charm of scenic beauty 
and literary association inspired this sonnet. — Ed.] 

VAUCLUSE 

Less because Petrarch and his Muse have made 
These hills and streams immortal as his fame, 
Linked in melodious verse with Laura's name, 

Than for thy sake, O Nature! have I strayed 

To this wild region. In the rocky glade, 

Deep at the mountain's base, the fountains keep 
Their ceaseless gushing, till the waters leap 

1 See " Uhland " in " Nothing to Wear and Other Poems," edition of 1899, 
p. 169. 

156 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

A mighty torrent from the endless shade; 
A moment linger there in glassy rest, 
Break on the craggy steep with foaming crest, 

Then thunder through the chasm, swift and strong! 
So burst the Poet's passion from his breast, 

Noiseless and deep and pure, to flood erelong 

The listening tracts of Time with ceaseless tides of song! 

Railroads being unknown, this splendid highway skirt- 
ing the northern shore of the Mediterranean, of all routes 
of travel in Europe perhaps the most desirable, was the 
favorite for making the journey from France to Italy. It 
avoided the mountain passes and secured for the tourist 
a wonderful variety of the most picturesque scenery. 
On our way we fell in with many travelers pursuing the 
same route. Among these we encountered the equipage 
of a certain lord lieutenant of one of the counties of 
England, Sir William Frazier by name, with whose prog- 
ress we became quite familiar. When we reached Genoa 
a young Englishman with high social connections, who 
was stopping at our hotel, attached himself to our party, 
never dreaming that we were other than true-born Britons, 
and confided to us his plans, among them an intended 
visit to the Nile, where he had heard there was good shoot- 
ing. Metcalf with great gravity cautioned him against 
shooting an ibis, which, he told him, was the sacred bird 
of Egypt. The young man was very grateful for the in- 
formation, and, following Captain Cuttle's advice, made a 
note of it. 

While we were all at dinner one day a letter was 
brought in to our young friend, which he opened and 

157 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

read. He then informed us that it was from Sir William 
Frazier inviting him to accompany Sir William to Rome 
in his carriage. He excused himself, and went into an 
adjoining room to write an acceptance of the invitation. 
Some weeks later an English friend of ours, Mr. Turbett, 
who happened to be with Sir William when the acceptance 
was received, gave us the text of it verbatim et literatim, as 
follows: 

"The Hon presents his compliments to Sir 

William Frazier and as I am going to Rome he will be 
very happy to take a seat in your carriage." 

Thus did the Queen's English suffer at the hands of 
one of her titled subjects. 

Keeping to the coast, with a detour to Pisa, we made 
our way to Leghorn and there embarked in the little Italian 
steamer Virgilio for Naples. This should have been a 
short voyage, broken only by touching at Civita Vecchia, 
the port of Rome, but we encountered a storm which 
drove us out to sea. On regaining the coast the cap- 
tain was compelled to put into a small bay, which proved 
a place of refuge in which to ride out the storm. After 
this, on reaching Civita Vecchia, we concluded to make a 
long stay, so that we did not reach Naples until the fourth 
day after leaving Leghorn. 

We lingered at Naples to make excursions to all the 
places of interest on the shores of the bay. We made a 
long day's exploration of the classic region which em- 
braces the villas of Cicero and Lucullus, the Lucrine Lake, 
and the Elysian Fields, as well as the ruins of Puteoli, 

158 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

said to be the most ancient town in Italy. On our home- 
ward way we had a wonderful view of Vesuvius. The 
smoke rose in a huge column straight into the sky; not a 
cloud near it. Turbett, our English friend, proposed, half 
seriously, a night excursion to the top to see the sunrise. 
I was ready for anything of the sort, though nobody else 
was; so Turbett and I agreed to go, and did go, and the 
night we made of it was more wonderful to me than any 
of the Thousand and One. 

After dinner we made our preparations and left Naples 
at half past-eight o'clock in the evening. I had just re- 
ceived letters by the Great Western, and these had quite 
recruited me after our hard day's work. At Portici we 
roused a guide, mounted our ponies, and by eleven o'clock 
had reached the Hermitage after a pleasant moonlight 
ride. On our way up we saw that there was an unusual 
amount of flame puffing out of the crater — a steady stream, 
instead of the occasional burst we had been accustomed to 
see. At the Hermitage we found no sign of a hermit, but 
a couple of soldiers stationed there to guard, not against 
eruptions, but against improper persons. A shabby fel- 
low in charge could give us no accommodations beyond a 
settee apiece in a very cold room. Our plan was to sleep 
at the Hermitage till five o'clock and then ascend for the 
sunrise. My friend Turbett managed to get some sleep, 
I hardly any — fortunately, for otherwise we should not 
have accomplished our purpose, the guide being fast asleep 
when five o'clock came, and nobody but myself awake. 

We started at once, leaving the horses at the Her- 

*59 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

mitage. But it was a long, rough walk to the foot of the 
summit, and quite exhausting. I found our previous day's 
journey and want of sleep a bad preparation for the tre- 
mendous climb before us, and when quarter of the way 
up I felt as if I should never see the top. I realized what 
"thorough exhaustion" meant; but after a little rest, and 
the assistance of an opportune brandy flask, I managed 
to recover and in about an hour and a half we got well 
up to the top. It was still dark, except for the moon- 
shine, and when we gained the summit the view that 
broke upon us was stupendous. The steady blaze was ac- 
counted for; there had been an eruption and the new lava, 
a tremendous stream of fire, twenty or thirty feet broad, 
was rolling from the foot of the cone (the flames came out 
at the top, the lava issued from below) across the scorched 
plains to the edge of the mountain. To call it a stream of 
fire comes as near the reality as possible, but it must not 
be supposed that it flowed as fast as water. It rolled 
along very much as a huge mass of mud would do; at 
the rate, as I judged by comparing its course with sta- 
tionary objects, of from two to three miles an hour, in 
some places faster, in others slower, as the channel was 
unobstructed or otherwise. The part of the area in which 
we had stood when previously on the mountain was cov- 
ered entirely by the stream, and it was almost impossi- 
ble to approach anywhere near it by reason of the extreme 
heat. We mounted to one of the ridges, and sat there 
looking at the torrent winding its way slowly along, as we 
waited for the sun to rise. 

1 60 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

In the mean time the views all around were most 
superb, and I hardly knew where most to fix my eyes, 
whether on the bright plains and sea and islands below, 
or on the mountain itself, or on the hills over which the sun 
was making his way. After the sunrise, which was fine, 
though somewhat obscured by clouds, we told the guide 
to take us across the lava, and said that we would mount 
to the top of the cone itself; for we had been watching 
the showers and perceived that on one side of the cone 
the stones never fell. He led the way and we followed. 
It was like walking over plates of burning iron, though 
we went far out of the way of the stream. Although 
I wore cork soles there were some places where my feet 
could hardly endure the heat. In every crevice under 
our path the blaze was perfectly bright and the atmos- 
phere all around like that in a furnace. It was worse 
around the fountain-head of the lava. At the foot of 
the cone there was a vapor bath of sulphur such as I 
hope never to have to take again. The whole air was 
Tartarean. It penetrated into one's lungs and almost 
stopped the breath. All we could do was to stuff our 
handkerchiefs into our mouths and call to the guide to 
run. I can not tell how rejoiced I was to get out of this 
pestilential region. 

At the foot of the cone we waited for a shower and 
then in the interval climbed up. It was like going up 
a hill of writing-sand, 1 an all-fours proceeding and a 
very severe one, but at last we stood on the highest point. 

1 Alluding to the fine dark sand which preceded the use <>f blotting-paper. — Kn. 

101 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Nothing very important was to be seen. A shelf pro- 
jecting over the crater on the inside prevented a view into 
the interior and the thick column of smoke wrapped every- 
thing in continual obscurity. I pitched a piece of lava 
into the crater, and watched its downward course until 
it disappeared in the smoke. Then we went down the 
cone at full speed. The guide told us to hurry, for the 
lava was making its way down to the path; so we ran 
on, halting in front of the stream for a minute or two, 
to watch it as it came tumbling and rolling, slowly and 
surely, in a straight course for the very path by which 
we ascended. Then we slipped and slid down the steep 
side, joined the horses, and had a glorious gallop down to 
the plain. I was thankful to have accomplished the trip 
in safety and to have seen this sight, the most wonderful 
I ever saw or expect to see. 

On our way up we had met a man, an Englishman, 
who was being carried in a chair to Patrici. We found 
afterward that he had broken his leg on the mountain. 
All the "labors, dangers, and suffering" we had under- 
gone — and I have not expanded on these as much as 
I might — left us with no injurious effects. We joined 
Duyckinck and Metcalf at Patrici, and the same day 
went to Sorrento and then crossed to Capri. Returning 
to Naples the next evening, we saw the side of Vesuvius 
covered with the still blazing stream of lava. 

On one of our excursions outside the entrance to 
Pompeii I made a transcript of the following advertise- 
ment of a newly established hotel. I presume it has 

162 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

found its way into print before this and been passed on to 
fame by other tourists, but I want to do my share in giv- 
ing it immortality as a specimen of "English as she was 
wrote" at the gate of Pompeii in 1847: 

"Restoration Hotel. Fine Hok. 
Kept by Frank Prosierpi 
Facing the Military Quarter 
At Pompeii. 

"That Hotel open since a very few days is renowned for 
the cleanness of the apartments; for the exactness of the 
service, and for the excellence of the true french cookery. 
Being situated at proximity of that regeneration it will be 
propitious to receive families, whatever which will desire 
to reside alternatively into that town to visit the monu- 
ments new found and to breath thither the salubrity of 
the air. 

"That establishment will avoid to all the travelers, vis- 
itors of that sepult city and to the artists (willing draw 
the antiquities) a great disorder occasioned by the tardy, 
and expensive contour of the iron-whay — People will find 
equality thither a complete sortment of stranger wines 
and of the King-Dom, hot and cold baths stable and 
coach house, the whole with very moderate price. 

"Now all the applications and endeavors of the hoste, 
will tend always to correspond to the tastes ami desires 
of their customers, which will acquire without doubt, to 
him, into that town the reputation whom he is am- 
bitious." 

[6 3 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

A novel and adventurous, perhaps foolhardy, bit of 
travel was our tour through the Island of Sicily, crossing 
the interior from Palermo to the sea and thence by Catania 
and iEtna coastwise to Messina. Our object was to see 
the ruins of Segeste, Selinunte, Girgenti and Taormina. 
With a trustworthy guide, a muleteer and a small boy, 
our party of four, Turbett having kept with us, made a 
respectable caravan. We made our way, day after day, 
over mountain passes, through rough bridle-paths and 
long stretches of scenery, stopping at forlorn and filthy 
hostelries, fording swollen rivers, at the brink of one of 
which we were brought to a stand-still and compelled to 
take refuge in the barn-loft of a farmer, who gave us 
shelter for the night and where perhaps we were in 
greater danger than we thought. Not so much, however, 
as when we undertook to cross the river, swollen and 
rapid, two men holding each mule to prevent its footing 
being swept away by the waters. Fortunately we all 
crossed in safety. 

The ruins of Sicily, especially those of the ancient 
Grecian temples of Girgenti, are magnificent, but the 
island of Sicily, when we traversed it, was a deplorable 
and disheartening sight, apparently as far behind in all 
the arts of civilization as when the Saracens and the Nor- 
mans held it under control. One memorable morning in 
the early sunlight, as I rode on, somewhat in advance of 
my companions, a turn in the road brought me in full view 
of Mount i£tna, a snowy mass rising above the plain and 
of such gigantic bulk as to dwarf the memory of Vesuvius 

164 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

into insignificance. It was one of the grandest, most 
awe-inspiring of spectacles, losing none of its impressive- 
ness in the many views we had of it afterward, in ascending 
as far up as we were able to go on the only possible path- 
way. Never were tired travelers more rejoiced to find a 
resting-place than was our worn-out party when, at the 
end of our fourteenth day of rough riding, we reached and 
were able to enjoy the comforts and luxuries of one of the 
most charming hotels we had found in Europe. It was 
kept by Signor Abbate. Poor Abbate! He met with a 
sad fate. In 1848 the revolutionary days came on, and 
there was uprising and firing in the streets of Catania, as 
in other cities in Europe. Impelled by curiosity, our 
worthy host went around the corner from his hotel, and a 
bullet, either by chance or design, ended his beneficent life. 
Nothing became our visit to Sicily so well as the ending 
of it. We found that a steamer for Naples was to leave 
Messina early on a mid-week morning and we timed our 
arrival on the evening before its departure. Reaching 
the hotel we notified the proprietor of our intention to 
sail the next morning for Naples and were met by a 
look of astonishment and an emphatic "Im-pos-si-bi-le." 
"Why impossible?" we asked. ''Because, Signori," ex- 
claimed the landlord, "your passports must go to the 
chancellor to be examined and approved, which will 
take one day, and on the next day to the prefect of police 
to be vised before you can depart, and you will have to 
wait for the steamer of next week." This was all an 
exceedingly agreeable situation for mine host, but cor- 

165 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

respondingly disagreeable for his four American guests, 
who speedily found a plan to escape from his clutches and 
from the Island of Sicily. 

After a hearty dinner we engaged the services of a 
clever cicerone, ascertained from him the lodgings of the 
chancellor whose duty it was to examine the passports 
and certify to our good character, and engaged him to 
be at the hotel very early the following morning. Rising 
betimes we had our luggage conveyed to the pier, off 
which at some distance in the harbor lay the steamer, ac- 
cessible only by small boats. Then we made our guide, 
who was somewhat amazed at our audacity, conduct 
us to the dwelling of the chancellor, whom we got out of 
bed and into a dressing-gown. Pleading the urgency of 
our case, we asked the extraordinary favor of an immedi- 
ate examination of our passports and permission to depart 
from the island. He was a very good-natured official. 
Being satisfied, after an examination, that we were not 
dangerous to the peace of the realm, he took pen and 
paper, and drew a deposition, which we all signed; 
and he then endorsed our passports in due form. With 
many thanks and profound salutations we took our leave. 
"What shall I give him ?" said I to the cicerone. "One 
piaster,'' he replied and the chancellor's fingers closed 
over the coin. We hurried to the office of the prefect 
of police, who had just seated himself at his desk for 
his day's work, a surly figure. After a glance at the 
chancellor's certificates he affixed his vise to our pass- 
ports without a word, and we filed out of the office. 

1 66 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

"What did you give the prefect?" asked our guide. 

"Haifa dollar," I replied. 

He uttered an exclamation of surprise. 

"You should have given him a great deal more." 

"I only gave the chancellor a dollar," was my reply, 
at which, to my consternation, he said, "The chancellor 
is nobody, a mere clerk, while the prefect" 

It was too late to correct my blunder and we were 
on the full run to the pier. The funnels of the steamer 
were smoking and she was on the point of steaming away 
when our small boat overhauled her, just in time for us 
to gain her deck whence we saw the receding shores of 
Sicily gradually sink out of sight. 

[The party of young men returning from Sicily took a 
second look at Naples and then went directly to Rome, 
where they spent three weeks. In a letter dated Feb- 
ruary 1 8, 1847, my father writes to his mother: 

"We got here Saturday night the 30 of January, a 
date less interesting perhaps to you then to me, who am 
inclined to think Rome, after all, the place of all others 
most worth such a pilgrimage as we are making. . . . 

"We are very comfortably settled — after spending one 
day at a Hotel, we spent nearly the whole of another in a 
search for lodgings, renewing our Parisian experience in 
a similar emergency of half a hundred flights of stairs 
and innumerable suites of 'apartments' of all sorts, shapes 
and sizes, except the right ones. Finally after exploring 
a great part of the Modern City to no purpose, we found, 
within a do/en doors of our Hotel, the very thing we 
wanted. . . . 

"Our landlady is most assiduous in attentions, and 
we have the very *ne plus ultra' (being at Rome you see 
revives one's classical habits) of 'cameriere' (Anglice— 

167 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

'chambermaids') in an old woman whose sole pervad- 
ing idea appears to be our comfort. I think you would 
highly approve of her, for she insists amongst other things 
on having our boots over night, putting us all into slip- 
pers, sometimes at a very early hour." . . . — Ed.] 

It was nine years since I had been in Rome. While 
I saw little change in the medieval dirt by day and dark- 
ness by night I found the body politic had undergone a 
great change. Gregory XVI had been gathered to his 
fathers and fitly entombed in St. Peter's. Cardinal Mas- 
tai Ferretti, fifty-five years of age, of a noble family, first 
a soldier and afterward a priest, had become Pope under 
the name of Pius IX. His comparative youth, his fine 
figure, his benignant presence, his liberal views and his 
supposed friendliness to reform, conspired to make him 
an ideal pontiff. His accession to the Holy See was 
greeted with enthusiasm throughout the states of the 
Church on the part of the promoters of advanced ideas, 
and the new Pope immediately established a lasting pop- 
ularity with the people. It was told of him that, on taking 
possession of the Vatican, he reduced the daily expenses 
of the table for his own service from two hundred scudi, 
the Gregory outlay, to three scudi; he had gone incognito 
to visit a poor woman who had fallen downstairs; had 
graciously received, as he was entering St. Peter's to say 
mass, from a poor man a bouquet, and placed the flowers 
in front of him on the high altar, where, in fact, I saw 
them a day or two afterward. I had the opportunity of 
observing him at numerous functions, such as the in- 

168 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

vestiture of newly appointed cardinals in the palace of 
the Quirinal, and the many services of Holy Week to 
which the new pontificate gave unusual interest. I saw 
him in the celebration of mass, in the washing of feet of 
the twelve apostles (represented for the occasion by well- 
selected pilgrims), and in his bestowal of the papal bene- 
diction from the front balcony of St. Peter's upon, per- 
haps, as large a concourse as had ever been gathered in 
the great Piazza. On all of these occasions he was al- 
ways the same — dignified, graceful and benevolent. 

At this time the Pope and the cardinals moved freely 
with the Roman people, and their splendid equipages were 
familiar sights in the streets of the Eternal City. Wher- 
ever and whenever the Pope appeared he was greeted 
with every token of affection, while the cardinals, with- 
out exciting enthusiasm by their presence, furnished by 
their black horses and highly decorated attendants a sight 
always pleasing to the populace. 

All this was afterward changed. Like Louis Philippe, 
whom we had seen in what seemed to be his secure seat 
of power in Paris, Pius IX. was soon to be a fugitive from 
his palace; not indeed, like the French king, doomed to 
foreign exile, but destined to be shorn of his temporal 
power, stripped of his dominions and forced to elect a 
voluntary imprisonment within the walls of the Vatican. 

But we were happy in the enjoyment of the early 
auspicious days of the new pontificate. We shared this 
enjoyment with many good American friends, which made 
the winter of 1847 ul R° mc memorable for charming 

169 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

American companionship. Of the young men who dined 
together at the "Lepri," and then adjourned to the Caffe 
Greco in the Via Condotti, were many who were to at- 
tain eminence in later life. George William Curtis, 
John F. Kensett, Thomas Crawford, Thomas Hicks, 
Luther Terry, and Christopher P. Cranch were among 
them. The Caffe Greco had, in the rear of the premises, 
a long narrow room, with seats on either side, like a 
stationary omnibus, and there, night after night, a com- 
pany of Americans, who hailed the advent of Pius IX 
as the dawn of a new era, discussed art, literature and 
politics. When in 1898 I was in Rome for the last time 
I looked for the ancient cafe, but found that it existed 
only in name, and had fallen to the base uses of a com- 
mon wine-shop. 

Probably for the first time since the American Revo- 
lution we managed, but even then under the surveillance 
of the pontifical police, to celebrate Washington's Birth- 
day by a dinner in Rome. It was attended by nearly all 
of the American tourists, and the encomiums of Pius IX, 
blended with the memories of Washington, were as sincere 
as they were patriotic. 

[In Rome my father enjoyed the friendship of Hiram 
Powers, then in the height of his fame. 

In a letter home dated April 21, 1847, m Y f atner says: 
"I see a great deal of Powers, and am delighted. The 
Greek Slave is just on the point of being shipped for the 
U. S. The owner, a gentleman of N. Orleans, has given 
permission to have it exhibited all over the country, for 
Power's benefit, of course. It will be first at Boston, 

170 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

and then at N. York. But I hope it will not come to the 
latter place before I get home, for I want the pleasure 
of going with you to see it. It is the greatest work of the 
age — I mean this actual age — whether greater altogether 
than anything of Canova, I am not prepared yet to say 
what my opinion (this of course only for my own satis- 
faction) is. But to compare it with the single works of the 
same class, as for instance Canova's Venus at the Pitti 
Palace, it is far superior, and so everybody says. He 
is hard at work now. The Slave has been ordered by 
several persons — Lord Ward the last, and two or three 
copies are going forward now in the studio. The Eve as 
perfect in its way is soon to be put in marble — and in 
the mean time he has orders innumerable. His bust of 
the Grand Duchess, a splendid thing, has put him in 
great favor with the Court here, and his reputation a 
stranger soon finds to be of that permanent, established 
sort that nobody thinks of contradicting or arguing about. 
He has a bust of Genl. Jackson which ought to be in 
New York and I think on the strength of the excitement 
that will inevitably follow the exhibition of the Statue it 
will be an easy matter to get it ordered. " 

From Rome the travelers journeyed to Florence and 
thence to Venice, whence my father writes enthusiastically 
to one of his sisters: 

"What shall I tell you now about Venice — of all places 
the most satisfying coming the nearest to expectation and 
fancy always beyond reality, the most novel, and per- 
haps most charming chiefly for that very reason. I was 
enchanted with Venice, and our stay there, though only a 
week long was complete and left nothing to regret— every 
day clear, bright and warm, every night beautiful with 
a growing moon. So we wandered about, sometimes 
walking, sometimes sailing — 'one foot on sea and one on 
shore' with the freshest sense of enjoyment, as in an en- 
chanted region, for there is nothing familiar to us on terra 
firma that Venice can be compared to — it is unreal, dream- 
like and the satisfaction one has in it resembles more than 
anything I know of the exhilarating delights of childhood. 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

As Mrs. Jameson says 'O! to make children of us again — 
nothing like Venice!' To hear no sound of hoofs and 
wheels, to see no dust blowing across the streets into your 
open windows — to be in a great city without a single con- 
sciousness of bustle or noisy trade or any of the desagre- 
ments of a crowded population, so that even in the great 
square of St. Mark you can sit quietly with a thousand 
people besides, a whole evening, as in a vast palace court 
with nothing to disturb you — to say nothing of gondolas 
and palaces and famous pictures, and grand churches, 
and the sea all around with sweet islands for sunset ex- 
cursions — nothing of associations historic and poetic — or 
rather to include all these in the sum total, and still what 
idea of Venice can I give you." 

Here at Venice he composed another one of those 
poems of travel which indicate, as it were, the high-water 
mark of enthusiasm and emotion. — Ed.] 

TITIAN'S "ASSUMPTION" 

Burst is the iron gate! 

And, from the night of fate, 
Out of the darkness and the gloom abhorred; 

Amidst the choral hymn, 

With cloud and cherubim, 
The Virgin leaves the tomb — arisen like her Lord! 

Free in the heavens she soars, 

While the clear radiance pours, 
Like a vast glory, round her upward face; 

And higher still, and higher, 

With the angelic choir, 
The soul by grace regained, regains the realms of grace. 

In mortal shape! and yet, 

Upon her brow is set 
The new celestial glory, like a crown; 

Her eyes anticipate 

The bright eternal state; 
Her arms to heaven extend; to her the heavens reach down! 

172 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

We, with the saints beneath, 

Half lose our mortal breath, 
With sense and soul still following where she flies; 

They, rapt into the light 

Of the miraculous sight — 
We, of the wondrous art that gives it to our eyes! 

After Florence, Venice, and Vienna, we found at Ber- 
lin a pleasant welcome from our Minister, Major Andrew 
Jackson Donelson, whom I have spoken of before as the 
private secretary of General Jackson during his presidency 
and who, with his charming family, were now at the Prus- 
sian Court. Henry Wheaton, who for sixteen years had 
represented the United States at Berlin, first as charge 
d'affaires and then as minister, was a scholar and an 
author well fitted for a diplomatic post which gave him 
full opportunity to follow his favorite pursuits. The 
whirligig of politics had removed Mr. Wheaton and sub- 
stituted in his place Major Donelson, who took me to 
Potsdam to visit Baron Von Humboldt, then living in the 
palace with the king and on very friendly terms with the 
American minister. 

We found the great naturalist established in rather 
shabby quarters in the palace. He received us in a room 
bare of any adornment and sparsely furnished. We had 
a long and very pleasant interview with him. He spoke 
English perfectly, went over some of his experiences in 
Mexico, and seemed really interested in doing the talking, 
to which I listened with the deepest interest. 



'73 



CHAPTER XII 

LONDON— BREAKFAST WITH SAMUEL ROGERS— HIS TABLE TALK— LETTER 
FROM MRS. GEORGE BANCROFT — LITERARY CELEBRITIES — CONTRIBU- 
TIONS TO "THE LITERARY WORLD" AND "THE DEMOCRATIC REVIEW" 
— POEMS OF TRAVEL — RETURN HOME — MEXICAN WAR — TREATY OF 
GUADALUPE HIDALGO — WILMOT PROVISO — PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF 
1848 — FREE SOIL PARTY. 

PRESIDENT POLK early in his administration had 
relieved George Bancroft from the uncongenial post 
of Secretary of the Navy and appointed him Minister to 
England. My visit to London in the fall of 1847, which 
completed my long European tour, was made most agree- 
able by the kindness of Mr. and Mrs. Bancroft in ena- 
bling me to meet the men whom I most desired to see. 
At his rooms in The Albany, where he lived very simply, 
I met Lord Macaulay, who was in one of his most genial 
conversational moods and I listened in breathless silence 
while he gave a monologue on the Temple and the Rules 
of the Order. Carlyle we visited at his house in Chelsea. 
Emerson had been there as a guest, and Mrs. Carlyle, 
who seemed to be a somewhat matter-of-fact person, de- 
clared she could hardly make him out. I have an indis- 
tinct recollection of a certain querulousness in Carlyle's 
tone which, I suppose, was natural to the philosopher, 
and was characteristic of his more public outgivings. 

174 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Lord John Russell, Hallam, and other notabilities were 
within the circle of my brief opportunity. 1 

Samuel Rogers, banker and poet, author of "The 
Pleasures of Memory," retaining at an advanced age all 
his faculties and enjoying the evening of his life with his 
many friends, was fond of entertaining Americans in his 
handsome house fronting St. James Park, and, one morn- 
ing, in company with Mrs. Bancroft, I was invited to 
breakfast with him. He was a very genial host, full of anec- 
dote and table talk. Perhaps he said the same things a 
great many times to different guests at successive break- 
fasts, but some of the good things I brought away may not 
be unworthy of record. We were received in a drawing- 
room looking out on the park and having one of those 
large bay-windows which actually let in light and warmth 
even in London. The room was hung with the gems of 
Rogers' collection of pictures, and crowded with his virtu- 
oso treasures. 

[On his return to his lodgings after breakfasting with 
Rogers, my father wrote in his diary, by one of his re- 
markable feats of memory, a full account of this visit. 
It is too lengthy to admit of its being introduced here in 

1 My father and his friends, at this time were living in London in lodgings 
at No. 40 Craven Street, concerning which he wrote to his mother on No- 
vember 16, 1847: 

"We are very comfortably off. We live in Craven Street (Strand), which 
was immortal previous to our taking rooms in it, by the famous epigram of 
James Smith of "Rejected Addresses" memory which ran thus: 

'In Craven Street, Strand, twelve lawyers find place, 

'And fifty coal barges lie moored at its base, 

'Fly honesty, fly, to some safer retreat, 

' For there's craft in the river and craft in the street.' "— F.n.] 

*75 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

its entirety, but certain extracts are given illustrative of 
Rogers' collection of objets d 'art and of his brilliant table 
talk, for both of which he was deservedly famous. — Ed.] 

He is infirm and old, like the Last Minstrel, much bent 
and tottering as he walks. His face is not remarkable. 
It does not indicate the poet any more than the banker. 
It has the faded feebleness which accompanies extreme 
old age always, the placid benevolence which dignifies 
it sometimes. 

We remarked on the beauty of the morning. "It is 
very kind of you to notice it," he said. "You who have 
so much splendor in America. " And then, as a kind of 
corroboration of the superiority of our climate, he brought 
out a book of paintings of American autumnal leaves, 
which had lately been presented to him. 

Speaking of the rarity of sunshine in London, he 
added, "Do you remember the answer of the Persian to 
the Englishman, who said to him, 'You worship the sun 
in your country, don't you?' 'Yes/ replied the Persian, 
'and so would you — if you ever saw him.' 

His book of autographs lay on the center table. He 
opened it to a splendid three-page letter of Washington 
to Hamilton, written when he was deliberating whether 
to serve the second presidential term. "Our country has 
never produced such a man as Washington," said Rogers, 
and I doubt if it ever will." 

Mrs. B. " But you have such a galaxy of great men 
in England, even Washington can be spared." 

Rogers shook his head — and then taking up a book 
that lay on the table, he added, " I don't think our country 
has a much better historian than this, or (taking up an- 
other) a much better poet than this." The first book was 
Prescott's "Peru," the second " Bryant's Poems." 

Rogers said he had seen Bryant, but he was so shy 
that it was difficult to draw him out. He (Rogers) spoke 
of his editorial occupations as a misfortune. 

He showed us a book which some one had given him 
printed by Franklin. 

176 



A RETROSPECT OE FORTY YEARS 

*' Franklin," said he, " came next to Washington." Then 
speaking of the Revolutionary War: "I remember very 
well the night my father, as he opened the Bible for even- 
ing prayers, said to us children, 'The siege of Boston is 
begun.' Erom that time all our sympathies were with 
you; the surrender of the army gave us great joy." 

He knew of one man, who, when the war broke out, 
was a shipper of artillery in government employ; he 
threw up his place when ordered to send supplies to Amer- 
ica saying, "I cannot ship artillery against my own coun- 
trymen." Of another person of consequence, who sent 
for his tailor to measure him for a suit of mourning; said 
the tailor, "You have lost some friend, some relative?" 
"Yes," he replied, "many — at Lexington." 

On the way to breakfast, Rogers showed us a sketch 
by Turner. It hangs in his library. The subject is 
Stonehenge, with one of the artist's most terrible, hurly- 
burly skies overhead, "enough to frighten anybody to look 
at," said Rogers. At the table the conversation naturally 
turned on Turner. 

Our host ridiculed Ruskin's new book ("Modern 
Painters") in which Turner is so overpraised. He sent a 
servant to the library for the book, and on its being 
brought, read an extract in which Turner is likened to 
the angel of the Apocalypse standing with one foot on the 
sea, and the other on the shore, etc., as the very climax of 
absurdity. 1 

Rogers spoke of the National Academy of London. 
"It is beginning to attract attention abroacl, there are so 
many fine things there," said he. I alluded to the small 
number of Van Dycks one sees there — thinking it strange 
that while there are so many all over England, and as 
Van Dyck was almost an Englishman himself, there 
should be only two or three of his pictures in the Academy. 

Rogers said, "The Van Dycks that are 'all over Eng- 
land' are not the best specimens of his style. His best 

1 1 have since looked in the hook in question for this passage, hut cannot find 
it. It must have been suppressed in later editions than that which Rogers read 
from, as too Ruskiny to suit any portion of the public taste. — W. A. li. iqoo. 

"77 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

pictures were painted before he left Holland. After he 
got here he found that the ladies liked to see themselves 
painted with very long, thin fingers, sprawling out in this 
way" (spreading out his hands against his coat), "and so 
he painted Van Dycks from morning to night — but those 
in the Academy are from Holland." 

He asked if we had, in America, casts from the an- 
tiques, especially from the Elgin Marbles — of which he has 
a great admiration, ranking them first of all among the 
relics of Greek art. (He has casts of them over his 
staircase, very well arranged for light and effect, and on 
returning to the drawing-room afterward pointed out 
some of their beauties.) Speaking of casts, he said they 
were as good as the originals, and in fact better, in the 
respect of their being free from stains. 

We sat some time at breakfast. It would have puz- 
zled an habitue of the Cafe Foy to have pronounced on 
the character of this meal — whether a dejeuner or a 
dejeuner a la fourchette — and Theuiller would probably 
have been shocked at its nondescript quality. But we 
were at the same table with Rogers — one of the few old 
names which bring back the old feelings, for to speak 
of Rogers is to speak of Byron, and Scott and Coleridge, 
and to talk with him is almost to talk with them. We 
looked up from our coffee and rolls to a genuine Raphael, 
a genuine Andrea del Sarto, and a genuine Titian. 

After breakfast, on our return to the drawing-room, 
Rogers showed us a small bookcase upon the upper cor- 
nice of which there is some carved work. He said : 
"Chantrey was dining here one day in a large company, 
and said to me, 'Do you remember some five and twenty 
years ago a workman coming in at that door and taking 
some measures for the carving of that bookcase ? I was 
that workman, and glad enough I was to get five shillings 
a day for the carving.' " 

There is a bust of Pope by Roubillac on a pier table. 
It is in clay. Rogers said that Flaxman's father remem- 
bered going into Roubillac's study when he was at work 
modelling it. Pope sat in an arm-chair before him. He 

i 7 8 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

showed us a beautiful antique bust — probably the head 
of an athlete. Canova brought it from Italy — it was 
found at the mouth of the Tiber. "He brought it into 
this room and placed it where it stands." 

"Here," said Rogers, "is a hand (a beautiful frag- 
ment) which Canova has kissed many times." 

He showed us his Etruscan vases, which are very 
fine specimens, and pointed out their beauties, sending 
into his library for certain books on art in which they are 
described by persons who have seen them in his house. 
He pointed out an exquisite fragment of a frescoe, by 
Giotto — two heads from the Chiesa del Carmine at Flor- 
ence; subject, two of the disciples approaching the tomb 
of Christ. "Before the Reformation," said he, "they 
painted with more religious feeling than since." 

There is a charming Guercino. It hangs on the 
left hand side of the room, close by the window: It is a 
Madonna and Child. The Virgin holds the infant naked 
in one arm — the left; on a finger on the right hand she 
has a bird, at which the Child is looking, half in de- 
light, half in surprise — the whole thing is exquisitely told. 
Nearby hangs a Raphael— the same subject. In this the 
Virgin is standing, and holds the Child upright in her 
arms. He is clinging to her as if a little frightened. It 
is a sweet specimen of Raphael. We admired these two 
pictures. Rogers said of the Raphael that, for a long time, 
he kept it in his bedroom; but, at last, his friends per- 
suaded him to bring it down stairs and place it among 
the others. 

Mrs. B noticed the beautiful manner in which the 

maternal feeling was expressed in the picture. 

Rogers. "Yes, and there is nothing like it. Do you 
remember what Gray says — 'that a man may have many 
friends, many brothers, many sisters, but he has only one 
mother — a discovery' he adds, 'which 1 did not make 
until it was too late.' I remember as well as if it were 
yesterday, though 1 was only eight years old, when m\ 
mother died. She said to her children 'It makes no dif- 
ference what happens to you— only be good;' ami that 

179 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

is the truth," continued he, laying his hand on his heart. 
"What becomes of us in this world is of no consequence, 
so long as we are right here." 

Of West, Rogers told a story which I think he said he 
had from West's own lips. His mother left him one day, 
when a small boy, in charge of the baby, who was asleep 
in the cradle, with strict injunctions to watch it carefully. 
Presently he was so struck with the appearance of the 
child that he could not help trying to make a sketch of 
it, and so with a pencil and paper went to work and be- 
came so engrossed in the process as to quite forget his 
charge. When his mother returned she found the baby's 
face covered with flies. "Whereupon," said the President 
of the Royal Academy, "she began scolding me; but 
when she saw what I had been about she gave me a kiss 
— "and that kiss did it:" 

Of Lady he told this: "She said to me one day 

'you never come to see us.' 'But I will come.' 'Will 
you come to breakfast on Friday?' 'On Friday I will 
come to breakfast.' 'Name whom you would like to 
meet.' And I named them. Friday came and I forgot 

all about it. The first thing I knew Lady sent me 

these verses." Whereupon he produced the verses and 
read them capitally. They do not differ much from this: 

"When a poet a lady offends, 

In prose he ne'er favor regains, 
And from Rogers can aught make amends, 
But the humblest and sweetest of strains? 

"In glad expectation, our board 

With roses and lilies we graced, 
But alas! the Bard kept not his word, 
He came not for whom they were placed. 

"In silence our toast we bespread, 

Then played with our teaspoons and sighed, 
Insipid tea, butter, and bread, 
For the salt of his wit was denied. 

1 80 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

"In wrath we acknowledged how well 

He, the Pleasures of Memory who drew, 
For mankind from his magical shell, 
Gives the pain of Forge/fulness too!" 

He told a story of Lady Charlotte Lindsey (Lord 
North's daughter). There was a discussion one day at 
dinner on the question — Suppose a lady arrives in Eng- 
land from France with only one word of English at com- 
mand, what word would be most serviceable ? Every- 
body said of course, Yes, that is the most useful of words. 
Lady Charlotte said "Not at all. No is much more 
useful, for, with a lady, yes never means no, but no very 
often means yes" 

We turned again to the book of autographs — a rare 
collection — containing, besides, the most valuable part of 
his correspondence with many of his contemporaries more 
illustrious than himself. He read with much emphasis, 
part of a letter from Byron, in which he dwells on his 
domestic troubles, etc. 

Turning to a letter of Fox — "I knew him well," he 
said, "and I saw him on his deathbed — Sheridan too." 

He called our attention to a manuscript page of Wa- 
verly as showing how few alterations Scott made in his 
draft. From a letter of Scott to himself he read some ex- 
tracts. 

I noticed in the book a letter of Mozart written in a 
peculiarly elegant hand. 

After this, at the request of Mrs. B , than whom 

no one could more gracefully or successfully have drawn 
him from one topic of interest to another, Rogers sent for 
his journal, the sanctum sanctorum of his memories, and 
read several passages. It is intended for publication after 
his death. He read us the preface — it is a very pleasing 
introduction to very pleasant matter. 

Of Scott he read the following story, very much as 
it is given in Lockhart's Life, where it is credited to 
Rogers: "There was a boy in my class at school who 
stood always at the top nor could I with all my efforts 

1S1 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

supplant him. Day came after day and still he kept his 
place do what I would; till at length I observed that 
when a question was asked him, he always fumbled with 
his fingers at a particular button in the lower part of his 
waistcoat. To remove it, therefore, became expedient in 
my eyes, and in an evil moment it was removed with a 
knife. Great was my anxiety to know the success of my 
measure and it succeeded too well. When the boy was 
again questioned his fingers sought again for the button 
but it was not to be found. In his distress he looked 
down for it; but it was to be seen no more than to be 
felt. He stood confounded and I took possession of his 
place; nor did he ever recover it or ever I believe, sus- 
pect who was the author of his wrong. Often in after- 
life has the sight of him smote me as I passed him; and 
often have I resolved to make him some reparation but 
it ended in good resolutions. Though I never renewed 
my acquaintance with him I often saw him, for he filled 
some inferior office in one of the Courts of law at Edin- 
burgh. Poor fellow! I believe he is dead; he took early 
to drinking." 

"These things," said he, "Scott used to tell us at 
Holland House between night and morning. One of the 
most interesting of these morceaux and the last one I re- 
call was an account of an assembly at the house of the 
French Minister at which Talleyrand was present and 
also Fox. The latter had with him a son, a youth who 
was deaf and dumb, and who had come down for a visit 
to his father from the institution at which he was placed. 
With this boy Fox conversed a great deal, and with much 
animation, making use of signs. ' It was, ' said Talleyrand, 
'a most striking and touching spectacle to see the most 
eloquent man of his time conversing with a son who could 
neither speak nor hear.' " 

[Several years later, probably about i860, my father 
sent the complete diary account to Mrs. Bancroft, which 
she acknowledged in the following letter. — Ed.] 

182 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

My Dear Mr. Butler: 

I hasten to thank you for the very great pleasure 
you have given me and Mr. Bancroft also, by your notes 
of Mr. Rogers' charming conversation. 1 had forgotten 
that people could ever talk so well, and as I read them 
remembered every expression of the face and every in- 
tonation of the voice with which he uttered the words so 
familiar as you recalled them, but which I should have 
lost forever but for you. I doubt if there exists any where 
in England, so complete a record of what Mr. Rogers 
was in his very best moods and I cannot help wishing 
that Sidney Smith had been living when you were there; 
then you might have preserved some adequate impression 
of what his conversation must have been to produce the 
effect it did, but which seems so poor in the fragments 
Lady Holland gives us in her interesting biography. 

I hope you are as grateful as you ought to be for 
the memory which Heaven has given you, and which is 
granted to but one man in a million. I have never seen 
anything like it, except in Macaulay, and in a less de- 
gree in Edward Everett. Sir James Macintosh and 
Scott are said to have been wonderfully endowed too in 
that way. 

With very best regards to Mrs. Butler, and with 
renewed thanks for the pleasure you have conferred, 
I am, 

Yours very truly 

Elizabeth Bancroft. 
17 West 21st St. Jan. 14th. 

[The incident of my father's repeating fifty years later 
Lady -'s poem which had been read aloud by Mr. 

Rogers is told in his Memorial by Judge George C. Holt, 
and can be found on page 412 post. 

Although he does not mention it, my father evidently 
included in his travels a trip to Scotland. This is shown by 
the poem he wrote in the visitor's book at the Inversnaid 1 nn, 
of which I quote the first and the last two stanzas. -Ed.] 

[8 



•3 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

THE INVERSNAID INN 

[Written in the "Visitor's Book," October 18, 1847] 

The season is ended, the cold days begin, 

It's all over now with the Inversnaid Inn; 

Ben Lomond's bleak forehead, the tempest-tossed Loch, 

The wind as it whistles o'er forest and rock, 

The leaves whirled in heaps o'er the bog and the brook, 

But, more plainly, the leaves of this Visitors' Book, 

Proclaim the sad truth that the dark days begin, 

And it's all over now with the Inversnaid Inn! 

No, the season is ended, the dark days begin; 
From Stirling and Glasgow the last coach is in, 
The last joint is roasted, the larder is bare, 
The smoke from the kitchen has faded in air, 
The last bill receipted, the last guinea paid, 
The last shilling doled to the brisk chambermaid; 
The landlord may delve and the landlady spin, 
They will get no more cash from the Inversnaid Inn. 

A sad picture of life! its pleasures fly fast, 
The breezes of fortune give way to its blast, 
The bright hues of romance grow yellow and brown, 
The sunshine of fame is eclipsed by its frown, 
The warm glow of friendship and passion is chilled, 
The echoes of love in the bosom are stilled, 
The tempest without and the darkness within, 
We are left in the storm, like the Inversnaid Inn! 

I have endeavored not to draw too largely on the recol- 
lections of my foreign travel in 1846 and 1847. Biogra- 
phers, English and American, are very apt to give a large 
space to European correspondence or reminiscences of 
little general interest. Perhaps I have erred in the same 
way. Incidents of my tour to which I have not referred in 
these pages are contained in a short series of articles which 
I contributed to The Literary World under the title "Out- 

184 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

of-the-way Places in Europe," in an article in the Dem- 
ocratic Review of July, 1848, entitled "The Last of the 
Condes," the outcome of a charming visit to Chantilly, 
and in some of my "Poems of Travel" included in the 
edition of 1899. 

I left Liverpool on my homeward voyage December 4, 
1847, on tne steamer Hibernia, Captain Ryer, and again 
had hard luck in sailing westward. There was hardly a 
tolerably pleasant day on the whole passage. For three 
successive days a storm prevented observations, and on 
our nineteenth day out we were forced, for want of coal, 
to put into Halifax. After replenishing our bunkers we 
again set sail, arriving at Boston, the only American port 
of the Cunarders at that time, on the morning of the 
25th, after three weeks of discomfort, which, however, 
were soon forgotten in the warmth of a Christmas home- 
greeting in the early evening. 

During my absence in Europe the Mexican War had 
been going on and had been fought nearly to a finish. 
The annexation of Texas, accomplished at the close of 
Tyler's term of office, had been resented by Mexico, but 
she was not strong enough to make it a cause of war. 
The Polk administration, dominated by the Southern 
slave power, was eager for further expansion and the ac- 
quisition of new territory. Our claim to Oregon, which 
involved a controversy with Great Britain, was wisely 
settled by diplomacy. Mexico found herself constantly 
harassed by the demands of the Texans on the western 

is,- 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

border lines for the extension of the boundary of their 
State to the Rio Grande, and the disputes over this ques- 
tion of boundary naturally led up to hostilities. General 
Taylor made a hostile advance which was followed by 
an invasion of American territory by Mexican troops. A 
number of American soldiers were killed on American 
soil. After this, war was inevitable. Congress, about the 
middle of May, 1846, declared that by the act of Mexico 
a state of war existed, voted ten millions of dollars for 
its prosecution, and invited the enlistment of fifty thou- 
sand volunteers. 

The sober sentiment of the North was opposed to war 
and to the entire policy which had provoked it, but, once 
engaged in the strife of arms, hastened with unanimity to 
uphold the government and to sustain our soldiers in the 
field. While in Europe we had been greeted with the 
tidings of successive victories by the armies of General 
Taylor and General Scott, who were gathering on battle- 
fields of Mexico laurels to be used in future presidential 
contests. On September 14, 1847, General Scott entered 
the City of Mexico, and placed the Stars and Stripes 
over the halls of the Montezumas. Mexico was beaten. 
By the treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo in February, 1848, 
she ceded to the United States, partly as indemnity for 
the expense of the war and partly in consideration of a 
cash payment of fifteen million dollars, the Territory of 
Upper California, New Mexico, and the country between 
the Nueces and the Rio Grande, the disputed possession 
of which had brought on the war. 

186 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

By the law existing at the time of its acquisition by 
the United States, slavery was prohibited in all of this 
great domain. In the negotiations pending the treaty, 
our government was represented by Nicholas P. Trist, of 
Virginia, a thorough-going pro-slavery man. The Mexi- 
can government instructed its commissioners to insist on 
a provision that the United States would engage not to 
permit slavery in any portion of the territory ceded by 
the treaty. But this demand met with an indignant and 
vehement refusal on the part of Trist. He wrote to Mr. 
Buchanan, Polk's Secretary of State, "I assured them 
that if it were in their power to offer me the whole terri- 
tory described in our projet, increased ten-fold in value, 
and in addition to that covered a foot thick with pure 
gold, upon the single condition that slavery should be ex- 
cluded therefrom, I could not entertain the offer for a 
moment, nor even think of communicating it to Wash- 
ington." l 

Long before the treaty of peace with Mexico, in antici- 
pation of our gaining possession of the territory afterward 
acquired, the permission or prohibition of slavery within 
its bounds had become a burning question in and out of 
Congress. As early as the summer of 1846, a bill was 
pending in Congress placing at the disposal of the Pres- 
ident two million dollars which it was understood might 
be used in the purchase of territory. David Wilmot, a 
Democratic Representative from Pennsylvania, who had 
favored the annexation of Texas and was an advocate of 
1 Henry Wilson, "Rise and Fall of tin- Slave Power in America," vol. II, p. 26. 

187 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

the war with Mexico, made himself famous by offering as 
an amendment to the bill, a proviso prohibiting the intro- 
duction of slavery into the territory which should be ac- 
quired from Mexico. The "Wilmot Proviso," as it was 
called, became at once the keynote of organized oppo- 
sition in the North to the schemes of the slavery propa- 
gandists of the South. Just as the phrase " 16 to i " was 
on every lip during the presidential campaign of 1896, so 
the words "Wilmot Proviso" were heard at even- break- 
fast-table, dinner-table, and tea-table throughout the 
countrv. Thev stood for all that was involved in the 

J J 

desperate struggle to be made against the encroachments 
of slaverv by the conscientious and moral sentiment of 
the North. 

Later, at the session of Congress beginning in De- 
cember, 1846, a new bill increasing the sum to be placed 
at the disposal of the President from two million to three 
million dollars called forth a renewal of the "Wilmot 
Proviso" which, however, failed of adoption at that ses- 
sion and was temporarily withdrawn from the records of 
national legislation. Meanwhile discussion and debate 
continued and on the reassembling of Congress, in 
December, 1847, the question of providing territorial gov- 
ernments for Oregon, New Mexico, and California was 
urged. It was the long session and was protracted into 
the month of August, 1848. On the last day of the ses- 
sion the bill providing for the admission of Oregon was 
passed, but no legislation had been accomplished in re- 
spect to the territory acquired from Mexico. 

188 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

It was a presidential year, and was signalized in the 
political annals of the United States by the formation of 
the Free-Soil party, a brief and brilliant episode of vital 
importance to the progress of the cause of human freedom 
and the precursor of greater things than it was able of 
itself to achieve. For once the name of the party was 
not a mere label or trade-mark, but stood for principle. 
"Free Soil" summed up, in two words, the initial declara- 
tion of the party that there must be "no more slave States 
and no more slave territory," followed by the stirring 
words, "We inscribe on our banner Free Soil, Free 
Speech, Free Labor, and Free Men." 

From the moment that Robert J. Walker had mar- 
shaled the slave-holding Texas annexationists with their 
Northern coadjutors to overthrow the leadership of Van 
Buren and his friends in the Democratic party, the 
breach, thus created, had been steadily widening. In 
New York the Democracy had become hopelessly di- 
vided. The conservative portion, styled "Old Hunkers," 
were represented in the Cabinet by Governor Marcy and 
were in accord with the policy of the administration. 
The "Barn-Burners," whose name or nickname was a 
far-fetched derivation from a supposititious farmer who 
burned his barn to get rid of the rats, were opposed to 
Southern aggression and claimed to represent the true 
principles of the original Jeffersonian Democracy. At 
Washington all the efforts of the men in power were di- 
rected to territorial expansion. Texas, in the southwest; 
Oregon, in the northwest; California, on the Pacific 

189 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

coast, must be made permanent parts of the territory 
of the United States, and all, as I have already said, 
were finally acquired as the result of diplomatic conven- 
tion with England, treaty with Texas, and war with 
Mexico. 

The Democratic party nominated Lewis Cass for 
President. The Whig party seized upon General Tay- 
lor as the most available candidate, and placed him in 
the field without any declaration of principles or any 
pretence of a platform beyond his military achievements 
in the Mexican War. The Northern Democrats and 
Whigs and men of all shades of opinion who united in 
opposition to the extension of slavery, nominated Martin 
Van Buren for President and Charles Francis Adams for 
Vice-President. The chief political object in the nomi- 
nation of Mr. Van Buren, who was endorsed by a con- 
vention of Democrats held at Utica, was to secure the 
defeat of Cass in the State of New York. Mr. Van Buren, 
while running for the presidency on the Free-Soil ticket 
was able to render this service to freedom and to deliver 
the vote of his state to General Taylor, the result of the 
canvass being that Mr. Van Buren received 291,263 votes; 
General Cass, 1,220,544, while General Taylor's vote 
was 1,360,099, a plurality of 139, 555. 1 Mr. Van Buren's 
candidacy was on the basis of his anti-Texas letter, which 
lost him the presidential nomination in 1844 and com- 
mitted him to opposition to the extension of slavery into 
free territory. He was, however, reluctantly drawn into 

1 Edward M. Shepard, "Life of Martin Van Buren," p. 368. 

I90 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

the contest, and I do not think his heart was in it. He 
had been for too long a time the leader of the Democratic 
party North and South, pledged to the maintenance of 
slavery in the Southern States, without interference by the 
government, to be a fit representative of the growing sen- 
timent in the free States against the inherent moral evil 
of slavery. Besides, he found himself in strange com- 
pany. The vagaries and political antics of the Abolition- 
ists and Emancipationists of all descriptions were not at 
all to his liking. Still, he led the forlorn hope in the 
national contest with dignity, and with success so far as 
the result in New York established his hold on the De- 
mocracy of his own State. General Taylor was elected 
by a majority of thirty-six in the electoral college, to the 
great disgust of the Cass Democrats. 

Scott should have been the Whig candidate instead 
of Taylor. He was a master of the science of war, had 
long held a high reputation, and in politics had been con- 
sistent in his attachment to the principles and policy of 
the Whig party. But he was not popular with the masses 
and probably not fully trusted by the Southern Whigs. 
Taylor was a Southern man and possessed many ele- 
ments of popularity. His military record in the Mexican 
War was something of a surprise to the American people. 
"Old Rough and Ready," as he was called by his sol- 
diers, furnished a name to conjure with at mass-meetings 
North and South, and his famous order to one of his 
subordinates when advancing on a Mexican position, 
"A little more grape, Captain Bragg," was effectively 

IQI 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

applied in the tactics of his presidential campaign. No 
man was ever elected to the presidency of whom the 
people knew so little or whom they trusted so blindly. 
He was pledged to no platform or policy and had little 
practical knowledge of politics. 

The Free Soil party, aiding in the temporary defeat 
of the slave power in 1848, demonstrated the fact that 
there were in the North elements of opposition to the 
aggressions of that power, combining every shade of opin- 
ion and every degree of hostility. This opposition was 
growing in force, and was awaiting the time, for an irre- 
sistible uprising in favor of freedom, when the hour should 
strike and the man should appear. This was not to be 
until i860 and the coming of Abraham Lincoln. 



192 



CHAPTER XIII 

FIRST LEGAL CASES — DISCOVERY OF GOLD IN CALIFORNIA — THE CASE OF 
THE S. S. "UNION" — THE CASE OF THE SHIP "PACIFIC" — CUSTOM- 
HOUSE CASE — "THE COLONEL'S CLUB " — EVERT AND GEORGE 
DUYCKINCK — "THE SEXTON AND THE THERMOMETER." 

THE early days of 1848 found me hard at work at my 
desk in the office of the United States Attorney for 
the Southern District of New York. I had looked for- 
ward with great eagerness to beginning my professional 
work. Before I was admitted to the bar I had had some 
little experience in practising on the small scale permissible 
to students. While I was in my father's office I was in 
the habit of walking with my friend Duyckinck from 
Washington Place to Nassau Street, making our route 
through Greene Street to Canal, where, on the south side, 
a man named Biggar had a shop for the sale of books and 
engravings. He had a considerable stock, and Duyckinck 
and I occasionally stopped to examine it. He had a 
friend who had a small claim against a defaulting debtor. 
This claim, at Biggar's recommendation, was placed in 
my hands for collection, and I brought suit in the court of 
a justice of the peace who held his sessions in the evening 
at his house in White Street. I tried my case and won 
it. Before the justice called the next case on the calen- 
dar, the plaintiff in that case, who had sat through the 

193 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

trial of my issue, applied to me to act for him, as he had 
come to court without any counsel. Possessing myself 
of the facts, I readily agreed, nothing daunted at finding 
that my opponent was the constable of the court. When 
I called my first witness the constable claimed the right to 
examine him in his voir dire. My legal studies had not 
advanced so far as to instruct me what this kind of ex- 
amination meant, but I boldly assented, and was greatly 
relieved when I found that it related to the interest of the 
witness in the subject of the suit, the law at that time ex- 
cluding the testimony of any one interested in the result of 
the controversy. The witness passed the ordeal, and I 
had an easy victory in my second suit. 

I got away from the court room flushed with my 
double triumph in time to go to an uptown evening party 
at the house of Judge Samuel R. Betts, then and for 
many years afterward, the United States District Judge 
in New York. Since then I have tried innumerable cases 
in the State and Federal courts, from the lowest to the 
highest, but I do not think my head was ever so near 
striking the stars as on that memorable night. My first 
five-dollar fee I applied to buying for my mother a sou- 
venir, a silver napkin-ring, which still holds an humble 
place among the family heirlooms. 

My friend Biggar afterward placed in my hands an 
affair of his own and of considerable importance to him. A 
young man of a highly respectable family was a frequenter 
of his shop, and Biggar discovered, after his apparently 
desirable customer went away, that some engravings had 

194 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

simultaneously disappeared from his portfolio. His sus- 
picions being aroused, he had the young man watched, 
and soon possessed positive evidence that he was the 
thief. Criminal proceedings would have been of no avail 
to compensate Biggar for the loss of his engravings. Ac- 
cordingly, I set on foot a civil suit to recover their value, 
and the friends of the young man lost no time in making 
good the loss he had caused by his misconduct, occasioned, 
as we were quite ready to believe, by a tendency to klepto- 
mania. 

All this was playing at law. But when I began the 
practice in dead earnest, it possessed me with a fascina- 
tion from which, after the lapse of more than fifty years, 
I find myself hardly disenthralled. I was introduced at 
once into companionships and competitions which were 
most exciting and inspiring. A young lawyer in active 
practice has the immense advantage of learning from his 
opponents, and in every contest, whether successful or not, 
he gains strength and experience for the future. 

The year 1848 was an especially interesting period. 
Besides being a presidential year, with all its attendant 
electioneering excitements, it was marked by the revolu- 
tionary upheaval in Europe, which toppled over thrones 
and dynasties, and sent monarchs into exile, from Pope 
Pius IX to King Louis of Bavaria. The discovery of 
gold in California in the same year drew thousands of 
adventurers to the Pacific Coast. They went by land 
across the continent and by sea across the Isthmus of 
Panama, or round Cape Horn. Many men left New 

195 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

York to settle in California and became leading spirits 
in that far-off Eldorado. One of them went from a desk 
close to mine in the District Attorney's office. He was a 
singularly capable, painstaking and methodical lawyer, 
the last man who would be supposed to have any disposi- 
tion for an adventurous quest for fame or fortune in the 
wilds of California. But one day he quietly slipped away, 
and set out for the Golden Gate. There, in the exer- 
cise of the same qualities which he had shown when we 
worked side by side in New York, he acquired an honor- 
able place in the new community which he helped to rear. 
There at the present time (1899), in a green old age, he is 
still enjoying the wealth and the repute which it has been 
his good fortune to keep. This is William Barbour, one 
of the most prominent citizens of California. 

Two of my earliest and quite notable cases were con- 
nected with the gold-seeking period. The steamship 
Union, returning from California with some passengers 
and quite a large amount of treasure on board, went ashore 
on the western coast, some miles south of San Francisco, 
and was in danger of going to pieces in the breakers. The 
sailors were not under good discipline, and it soon became 
evident that they had an eye to the gold on board as well 
as to their own safety. The passengers, however, under 
the leadership of a New Englander who had, I think, been 
a school-teacher or professor, united in saving the lives 
of the ship's company and securing the treasure for the 
owners. With great difficulty a cable was carried to the 
shore and fastened there, and by means of ropes thrown 

196 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

over this cable, boats went from the ship to the shore, and 
all on board, as well as the boxes of gold and the ship's 
stores, were safely landed. Then the passengers stood 
guard over the gold, and the sailors were kept in order 
until the shipwrecked company was rescued by a south- 
bound steamer and brought in safety to New York. I 
was retained on behalf of the passengers to secure salvage 
for their services in saving and safeguarding the treasure. 
The underwriters, who were responsible to the owners of 
the boat, resisted the claim, and I found myself pitted 
against a number of veteran lawyers versed in all the in- 
tricacies of the law of marine insurance, but they yielded 
at last and by a fair settlement a handsome sum was 
awarded to my clients. 

In the other case, as it turned out, I was on the wrong 
side. The owners of the ship Pacific put her up for a 
voyage from New York, around Cape Horn to San Fran- 
cisco, and advertised for passengers. There was a rush 
to secure accommodations. The owners promised to fit 
up the vessel so as to give comfortable quarters and suffi- 
cient space and air and all other convenient arrangements 
for the comfort of the passengers on the long voyage. 
On the eve of sailing some of the passengers discovered 
that the ship owners had violated their promise, and had 
taken advantage of the demand for accommodations to 
fit up the vessel for a larger number than she could accom- 
modate, and in such a way as made it unsafe to embark 
in her; and the passengers therefore seized the vessel in an 
admiralty suit, claiming to hold her liable in large damages. 

197 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

I defended the owners, and took the ground that as the 
contract for fitting up the vessel was to be performed, not 
on the land but on the sea, the complaining passengers 
had no standing in the admiralty court against the ship, 
but must sue the owners for breach of contract in the 
common law courts. This gave rise to a long contest both 
in the United States District Court and on appeal in the 
Circuit Court. It was decided that as the contract was to 
be performed at sea, although the breach of it occurred on 
land, the ship was liable under the marine law, and it 
was condemned accordingly. 1 

Another case which came to me in the early part of 
my practice grew out of a blunder of the custom-house 
officials and gave rise to some curious complications. 
There used to be a periodical clearing out by sale at auc- 
tion of goods which had lain in the public stores un- 
claimed by any one, and on which no duties had been paid. 
Such goods accumulate in the course of time and the 
collector orders their sale after publishing a notice describ- 
ing them by the marks and numbers on the packages. 2 
Such a sale was advertised to take place. 

A worthy German, Stephen Lutz by name, who was 
employed about the custom-house, not only by the gov- 
ernment, but by importers, in carting away goods, some- 
times made purchases at these sales. On this occasion his 
attention was attracted by the appearance in the catalogue 

1 The Pacific. I Blatchford, p. 569. 

* As the law then existed, goods were sold in unopened packages and the pur- 
chasers took the risk and chance of what they might get. In this respect the 
law has since been amended. — Ed. 

I98 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

of thirteen cases described as "machinery," an unusually 
large number of packages to be included in one lot on 
such a sale. He made up his mind to bid for them, not 
having any idea whatever of the contents of the cases, 
but fancying that so large a quantity of machinery must 
have considerable value. Accordingly he told some of 
his friends, who entered into the venture with him, and 
at the sale Lutz bid off the thirteen cases for $500, which 
he paid. Having his carts at hand he carried off the 
boxes to a vacant lot in the upper part of the city, where 
he had arranged to open them, their great size making it 
difficult to get them into any ware-room. Great was the 
curiosity of the party of buyers to discover what kind of 
property they had acquired by their purchase, and it was 
greatly enhanced when, as case after case was opened, 
the machinery disclosed was of a kind which none of them 
could identify as belonging to any known trade, business 
or process. Finally, when some huge glass lenses of most 
elaborate cut and construction were unwrapped, they were 
wholly at their wits' ends. After a long consultation with 
the best experts they could employ the mystery was solved, 
and they found that they had bought the entire apparatus 
of a revolving, catadioptric Fresnel lantern and light for a 
light-house of the first magnitude. This Fresnel lantern 
had been manufactured in France for the United States, 
and was intended for the Carysfort Reef in Florida. 

Owing to some unexplained cross purposes between 
the manufacturers, their agents in New York and the 
government officials the whole apparatus had remained 

199 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

unrecognized and unclaimed in the public stores. There 
it had been treated as merchandise of private importa- 
tion, waiting for its owner to come forward, enter it and 
pay the duties, in default whereof it had been included 
in the clearance sale. 

The French firm who were the agents in New York of 
the manufacturers soon awoke to the situation, and be- 
tween them and the custom-house officials a prodigious 
hue and cry was raised for the lost beacon. Evidently 
some one had blundered; and in the eagerness to cover 
up the blunder, the injustice was committed of charging 
Stephen Lutz and his associates with a crime. They had 
known all along, so it was alleged, what these thirteen 
cases of machinery contained and by the aid of allies in 
the government service had contrived to possess them- 
selves of this great prize. While this was wholly untrue, 
it served as a justification for ignoring any right or equity, 
on the part of the purchasers, for a return of the $500 
which they had paid, and which had come into the United 
States Treasury, and for a summary seizure of the entire 
apparatus by the United States Marshal under a writ of 
replevin sued out in the name of the United States. 

In these straits Lutz came to our office. We could not 
retake the property, but we defended the suit, and, finding 
that our client and his friends were treated as wrongdoers 
and conspirators, determined to make the best fight we 
possibly could to establish that they were innocent pur- 
chasers, and had got a good title to what they had bought 
at a public sale. So we began a counter suit in equity 

200 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

against the collector and prayed for an injunction to re- 
strain him from parting with the possession of the prop- 
erty until the determination of the suit in which it had been 
seized and taken away from Lutz. Having got the matter 
in such shape that Lutz was protected in his rights, if he 
had any, then came the question whether he had any 
rights. The light-house apparatus had been imported for 
the use of the United States, and it was claimed, on behalf 
of the government, that being therefore exempt from pay- 
ment of duty, the collector had no right to treat it as dutia- 
ble and no power to sell it for non-payment of duty or to 
give any right or title to a purchaser. We set up two 
grounds of defense: first, that while the Tariff Act of 
1842 had provided that goods imported for the use of 
the United States should be exempt from duty, this provi- 
sion had been omitted in the Act of 1846, which repealed 
that of 1842 leaving all goods, public and private, to the 
operation of the custom laws; and, second, that the 
government, having got our money, could not retake 
the property without, at least, refunding the purchase 
price. 

The court decided that as the property belonged to the 
sovereign power, no duty was chargeable or collectable; 
the collector had no power to make the sale; the purchaser, 
however innocent, got no title; and the government was 
not obliged to refund the money voluntarily paid to it. 
The fact that the Tariff Act of 1846 did not exempt the 
goods from duty was immaterial. No statute was re- 
quired in aid of the sovereign right of the people of the 

201 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

United States. Strange to say, while this question had 
been argued by Mr. J. Prescott Hall, the United States 
District Attorney, for the government, and by my father, 
who was senior counsel, for Lutz, and had been decided 
by Judge Nelson on the assumption that there was no law 
applicable to it, the omission in the Act of 1846 had been 
supplied by a provision tacked on to a subsequent Naval 
Appropriation Bill, of which both counsel and Court were 
wholly ignorant. 1 

When not actually engaged in my professional duties, 
I could not turn wholly aside from literature and literary 
associates. I carried on for some time a series of papers 
on current topics under the title of "The Colonel's Club." 
In this first appeared "The Carnival of 1848," in which, 
with perhaps more truth than poetry, I chronicled the wild 
revolutionary changes which the whirligig of revolution 
was setting in frantic motion. To this series also belongs 
"The New Argonauts," which is a realistic picture of the 
rush of the gold-seekers to the Pacific coast. 

My friend, George Duyckinck, who had remained in 
Europe after I sailed for home, returned and resumed his 
residence with his brother Evert at No. 20 Clinton Place, 
not far from my own home. Their library, which con- 
tained a choice collection of books, especially rich in 
English drama and dramatic works (now in the posses- 
sion of the Lenox Library), was a rendezvous for men 
of like tastes as themselves. They were publishing, at 
that time, The Literary World, a weekly journal of liter- 

1 Reported 2 Blatchford, p. 383. 

202 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

ature and art to which I became a contributor, and in 
which, on March 24, 1849, appeared "The Sexton and 
the Thermometer." In this poem, which at once attained 
a certain sort of popularity, I rendered in rhyme a story 
which Evert Duyckinck had told me about Brown, the 
famous sexton of Grace Church, then in the height of 
his prestige. He figured in the poem as Diggory Pink. 
Brown admitted the truth of the whole tale, except the 
closing passage, in which he was made the recipient of a 
fee for raising the mercury 40 degrees. 

THE SEXTON AND THE THERMOMETER 

A building there is, well known, I conjecture, 

To all the admirers of church architecture, 

Flaunting and fine, at the bend of Broadway, 

Cathedral-like, gorgeous, and Gothic, and gay, 

Soaring sublimely, just as it should, 

With its turrets of marble, and steeple of wood, 

And windows so brilliant and polychromatic, 

Through which the light wanders with colors erratic— 

Now, golden and red on the cushions reposes, 

Now, yellow and green on parishioners' noses; 

While, within and without, the whole edifice glitters 

With grandeur in patches, and splendor in fritters; 

With its parsonage " fixed" in the style of the Tudors, 

And, by way of example to all rash intruders, 

Its solid dead wall, built up at great labor 

To cut off the windows cut out by its neighbor — 

An apt illustration, and always in sight, 

Of the way that the Church sometimes shuts out the Light! ' 

1 This ".lead wall" has long since l>ecn taken down and replaced by a hand- 
some gotbic wall, with windows, on the north side of the church enclosure. 

203 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Now it chanced at the time of the present relation, 
Not a century back, from this generation, 
When, just as in these days, the world was divided, 
And some people this way and that way decided, 
And like silly questions the public was vexed on, 
One Diggory Pink of this church was the sexton. 
None of your sextons grave, gloomy, and gruff, 
Bell-ringers, pew-openers, takers of snuff, 

Dusters of cushions and sweepers of aisles, 
But a gentleman sexton, ready enough 

For bows and good manners, sweet speeches and smiles; 
A gentleman, too, of such versatility, 
In his vocation of so much agility, 
Blest with such wit and uncommon facility, 
That his sextonship rose, by the means he invented, 
To a post of importance quite unprecedented. 
No mere undertaker was he, or to make 
The statement more clear, for veracity's sake, 
There was nothing at all he did not undertake; 
Discharging at once such a complex variety 
Of functions pertaining to genteel society, 
As gave him with every one great notoriety; 
Blending his care of the church and the cloisters 
With funerals, fancy balls, suppers, and oysters, 
Dinners for aldermen, parties for brides, 
And a hundred and fifty arrangements besides; 
Great as he was at a funeral, greater 
As master of feasts, purveyor, gustalor, 
Little less than the host, but far more than the waiter. 
Very brisk was his business, because, in advance, 
Pink was sure of his patron whatever might chance. 
If the turtle he served agreed with him, then 
At the next entertainment he fed him again; 
If it killed him, Pink grieved at the sudden reversal, 
But shifting his part, with a rapid rehearsal, 
With all that was richest in pall and in plumes, 

204 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Conveyed him, in state, to the grandest of tombs. 

Thus whatever befell him, gout, fever, or cough, 

It was Pink, in reality, carried him off; 

The magical Pink, as well skilled in adorning 

The houses of feasting as houses of mourning, 

For 'twas all the same thing, on his catholic plan, 

If he laid out the money, or laid out the man. 

But most with the ladies his power was supreme, 

Of disputing his edicts nobody would dream, 

For 'twas generally known that Pink kept the key 

Of the very selectest society; 

Parvenus bribed him to get on his list; 

Woe to the man whom his fiat dismissed! 

The best thing he could do was to cease to exist, 

And retire from a world where he wouldn't be missed. 

Thus, plying all trades, but still keeping their balance 

By his quick, ready wit and pre-eminent talents, 

His life might present, in its manifold texture, 

An emblem quite apt of the church architecture, 

Which unites, in its grouping of sculpture and column, 

A great deal that's comic with much that is solemn ! 

One Sunday, Friend Pink, who all night had been kept 

At a ball in the Avenue, quite overslept, 

And though to the church instanter he rushed, 

His breakfast untasted, his beaver unbrushed, 

He reached it so late that he barely had time 

To kindle the fires, when a neighboring chime 

(For 'tis thus that all church-bells must figure in rhyme) 

Proclaimed that the hour for the service was near; 

And, as ill-luck would have it, though sunny and clear, 

'Twas the coldest of all the cold days in the year. 

Poor Pink, if some artist, with pencil or pen, 

Had been on the spot to sketch him just then, 

As bewilderment drove him first here and then there, 

205 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

From chancel and transept to gallery stair, 
Now down in the vaults, and now out in the air, 
Might have stood as a model of Utter Despair, 
Whose crowning expression his countenance wore 
As he paused, for a moment, within the grand door, 
And glanced at a gentleman, portly and neat, 
Advancing quite leisurely up from Tenth Street. 
"Mr. Foldrum is coming; oh! what shall I do? 
He's got a thermometer hung in his pew! 
As sure as it's there, and the mercury in it, 
He'll find what the temperature is in a minute; 
And being a vestryman, isn't it clear 
That minute will cost me a thousand a year?" 

But luck, luck, wonderful luck! 

Which never deserts men of genuine pluck, 

No matter how deep in the mire they are stuck, 

In this very crisis of trouble and pain, 

With a brilliant idea illumined his brain; 

Down the aisle, like a cannon-ball, Diggory flew, 

Snatched the thermometer out of the pew, 

And then plunged it, bodily, into the fire 

Of the nearest furnace, just by the choir; 

Soon to ioo the mercury rose, 

And Pink, stealing quietly back on tiptoes, 

Hung it up stealthily, on the brass nail, 

Just as Foldrum was entering, under full sail. 

The church was as chilly and cold and cavernous 
As the regions of ice round the shores of Avernus; 
Like icebergs, pilasters and columns were gleaming, 
While pendants and mouldings seemed icicles streaming. 
Foldrum shivered all over, and really looked blue, 
As he opened the door and went into his pew, 
Then clapping his spectacles firmly his nose on, 
Took down the thermometer, surely supposing 

206 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

The glass would be cracked and the mercury frozen. 
No such thing at all; but, surprising to view, 
The mercury stood at 72! 

It had never deceived him, that great regulator, 
Not once to the atmosphere proved itself traitor; 
Had it fallen to zero, on the equator, 

He had shivered all over and doubted it not; 
Or if, upon Greenland's iciest shore, 
It had happened to rise to 80, or more, 

Had thrown off his bearskin and sworn it was hot. 
" Place me," might he cry, with the poet of old, 
" In the hottest of heat or the coldest of cold, 
On Lybian sands, or Siberian barren height, 
You never shall shake my faith in my Fahrenheit!" 

'Twas charming to see, then (Pink watched him with care), 

What a wonderful change came over his air — 

How he rubbed both his hands, and a genial glow 

Came flooding his cheeks like a sunbeam on snow; 

How quickly he doffed both his scarf and his coat, 

Unbuttoned his waistcoat down from the throat, 

And stifling a sort of shiver spasmodic, 

With assumptions of warmth, very clear and methodic, 

And with all sorts of genial and satisfied motions, 

With fervor engaged in his usual devotions. 

Just then enter Doldrum, 

Who sits behind Foldrum, 
And gauges himself, from beginning to end 
Of the year, by his old thermometrical friend, 
Well knowing that he takes his practical cue 
From the mercury, hanging up there in his pew, 
And can't make the mistakes that some people do. 
So off goes his pilot-cloth, spite of the cold or 
A twinge of rheumatics in his left shoulder; 
'Twas freezing, 'twas dreadful, it must be confessed, 

207 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

But there sat Squire Foldrum, who surely knew best, 
With his overcoat off and an unbuttoned vest! 
What's mercury made for, except by its ranges 
To declare, without fail, atmospherical changes? 

At the door the friends met. " Cold in church, was it not ?" 

Says Doldrum. "Oh no! on the contrary, hot; 

Thermometer 70; with these high ceilings 

You must go by the mercury — can't trust your feelings. 

Take a glass, after dinner, of Old Bourbon whiskey, 

Nothing like it to keep the blood active and frisky, 

If you're cold, but the air was quite spring-like and mellow; 

Why, Doldrum, you're growing old fast, my dear fellow!" 

But on Tuesday the joke was all over the town; 

Pink enjoyed it so much that he noted it down, 

And, thinking it shouldn't be laid on the shelf, 

At the risk of his place, he told it himself 

To one of the vestry, to use at discretion; 

And in very short time 'twas in public possession. 

Foldrum heard of it, too; saw how it was done, 

And felt that he owed the sexton one. 

Next Sunday he paid him. "Pink," said he, 

"I owe you a dollar; here, take your fee." 

"A dollar, sir? no, sir; what for, if you please?" 

" For raising the mercury forty degrees ! 

Extra service like this deserves extra pay, 

Especially done, as this was, on Sunday. 

So pocket the cash, without further remark; 

But, Pink, for the future, just mind and keep dark." 

"Thank you, sir," said the sexton; "I'm not a dull scholar, 

So, if you take the joke, why, I'll take the dollar!" 



208 



CHAPTER XIV 

RETURN OF BENJAMIN F. BUTLER TO NEW YORK — LAW OFFICE IN WALL 
STREET — A SUPPLY OF OFFICE BOYS — SUCCESSIVE LAW FIRMS — HIRAM 
BARNEY — ACCOUNT OF PROFESSIONAL LIFE — GENERAL TAYLOR — 
HENRY CLAY — HIS COMPROMISE — JOHN C. CALHOUN — DANIEL WEB- 
STER — HIS SEVENTH OF MARCH SPEECH — INDIGNATION IN THE NORTH 
— WHITTIER'S "iCHABOD" — DEATH OF PRESIDENT TAYLOR — COM- 
PROMISE OF 1850. 

THE active part which my father took in the presi- 
dential campaign of 1848, in favor of Van Buren 
and Adams in opposition to Cass and Butler necessarily 
led to a rupture with President Polk, and before the elec- 
tion my father's official relations with the government had 
been terminated. Leaving the old brick building at the 
north extremity of the Park, where the Federal offices 
were installed, long since destroyed by fire and replaced by 
the County Court House, my father and I removed to Wall 
Street, and took two rooms on the third floor of No. 29, 
which has also gone out of existence, and is now replaced 
by the Leather Manufacturers' National Bank. My 
father's business was chiefly that of counsel in cases 
brought to him by attorneys in behalf of their clients. 
This, of course, was of no direct advantage to me, but 
my hope was to gain a clientage and to build up a practice 
by my own efforts with his valuable aid. I had youth, 

209 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

good health, a passion for hard work and a tolerable 
equipment for professional competitions. All I wanted 
was opportunity and an office boy. 

The office boy came first. Having moved into my new 
rooms and hung my shingle on the outer wall of No. 29 
Wall Street, I advertised for this indispensable incumbent. 
The science of advertising "Wants" had not been brought 
to its present perfection, and in my simplicity I gave my 
office address, inviting application there. The following 
morning, as I alighted from the Broadway omnibus 
which had brought me to the head of Wall Street, I no- 
ticed an unusual number of boys, and as I descended to- 
ward Broad Street, the number was perceptibly increased. 
Upon coming nearer to No. 29 Wall Street it had grown 
to a crowd, surging upon and about the front steps and 
massed on the two flights of stairs leading to my own 
office. It was with the utmost difficulty that I could 
make my way through the mass of boys, to whom, in my 
folly, I had made possible this invasion, not only of my 
own but also of my neighbor's premises. I was imme- 
dately recognized by the whole body of boys as the ad- 
vertiser. "Here he is," went up and down the line. 
To deliberate was to be lost. I forced a passage through 
the dense mass, unlocked my door, rushed in and relocked 
it on the inside. After holding a minute's counsel with 
myself upon the problem — not how to get an office boy but 
how to get rid of a legion of them — my mind was made up. 
Unlocking the door and calling the nearest available boy, 
I engaged him at once, and opening the door on a crack 

210 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

called out that I had a boy. It took a long while for the 
juveniles to realize the situation and disperse. My chance 
capture proved a success. Charles, I believe that was 
his name, was industrious, faithful, and devoted to my 
interests as long as he remained with me. 

Following the office boy, came the opportunity. One 
day an elderly man with striking appearance, more cleri- 
cal than commercial in his garb and manner, called on my 
father and engaged him in a long interview. This visitor 
was Lewis Tappan, then and afterward conspicuous for 
his strong anti-slavery views and efforts, and for the part 
he took as a leader of the Abolition party, in opposition 
to the slave power, and withal a shrewd and successful 
business man. Both he and his brother, Arthur Tappan, 
were men of high repute and commanding influence. 
Lewis Tappan's son-in-law was Hiram Barney, of the law 
firm of Barney & Mitchell. He was essentially an office 
lawyer, and never went into court for the trial or argu- 
ment of cases. Mr. Mitchell had suddenly died, leaving 
Mr. Barney with a large business on his hands and in 
pressing need of competent professional aid for its man- 
agement, especially in litigated cases. Mr. Tappan's 
errand was to acquaint my father with these facts, and to 
propose an alliance on his part with Mr. Barney. He 
brought them together and I was Included in the nego- 
tiations. My father assumed the position of counsel to 
the new business, and I was placed in charge of its man- 
agement in court and in all ordinary litigation. We 
formed the firm of Barney ,\ Butler, and to avoid start- 

21 I 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

ing its business on the ist of April, selected the 31st of 
March for the commencement of the partnership. 1 

This was the beginning of a succession of firms of 
which I have been a member from that day to the present 
time. My father, whose co-operation and aid had been 
of immense service to me at the outset, soon withdrew 
from any relation with Mr. Barney and myself, except 
that of occasional counsel, although he retained his office 
with us until his death in 1858. Mr. Barney and I went 
on together until November 1, 1851, when Mr. James 
Humphrey of Brooklyn, joined us and our firm of Bar- 
ney, Humphrey & Butler continued until after Mr. 
Humphrey's election to Congress, when he withdrew on 
January 1, 1859, an d Mr. George W. Parsons came in. 
This firm of Barney, Butler & Parsons continued until 
the retirement of Mr. Barney and Mr. Parsons in 1873. 
The firm then became Butler, Stillman & Hubbard, com- 
posed of Thomas E. Stillman, Thomas H. Hubbard, and 
myself, and in 1880 John Notman, Adrian H. Joline, 
Wilhelmus Mynderse and my son William Allen Butler, 
Jr., became partners. On the retirement of Mr. Still- 
man and General Hubbard in 1896, the present firm of 
Butler, Notman, Joline & Mynderse came into being. 2 

1 For the first few months my father's office was in Wall Street. He after- 
wards moved to in Broadway, the Trinity Building, which had been recently 
erected just north of Trinity Church and which was torn down in 1906, being re- 
placed by the present handsome structure of the same name. In 1884 his offices 
were transferred to the Central Trust Company Building, 54 Wall Street. — Ed. 

2 After my father's death the firm name continued the same until the with- 
drawal of Mr. Joline, which took place January 1, 1905, at which date the firm 
of Butler, Notman, Joline & Mynderse ceased 

With my brother, William Allen Butler, Jr., who had been a partner since 

212 



A RETROSPECT OE FORTY YEARS 

The French proverb that it is the unexpected that hap- 
pens was never more applicable than to the circumstances 
which, as I have related them above, brought me into 
contact and close relations with Mr. Barney. They gave 
me what I wanted — a chance in my profession. Mr. 
Barney, partly through the influence of the Tappans and 
largely by his own professional ability, particularly as a 
manager of affairs and negotiator in differences between 
business men, had a large clientage of the best character 
and had many active litigations in progress when I 
joined him. I had then as much as I could do to 
keep pace with the necessities of the business which had 
so suddenly fallen into my hands. Mr. Barney, as I have 
said, never went into court. He was not a student of the 
law as it was contained in books. He answered very 
much to the description of the lawyer who said he was 
not much of a lawyer, but he was a good judge of the law. 
Mr. Barney never drew pleadings or prepared legal briefs, 
but he was one of the best and most careful of draftsmen 
in preparing contracts and other papers requiring a 
knowledge of legal principles and foresight in their appli- 
cation, and he was very quick and clear in apprehending 
legal relations and rights, and most fertile in suggesting 
remedies. I recall a case most complicated in its entan- 
glements and in the legal questions involved, which 1 

1880, the firm was continued under the name of Butler, Notman & Mynderse, 
until it was dissolved by the deaths of Mr. Mynderse, which occurred on No- 
vember 15, 1006 and of Mr. Notman, which occurred on January 6, 1907. 

On June 5, 1907. Hon. William J. Wallace, late presiding justice of the 
United States Circuit Court of Appeals, was invited to join the firm, and its 
name became Wallace, butler & brown, with offices at 5.} Wall Street — Ed, 

213 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

tried and argued with great attendant study and no little 
doubt. I stated it to him at an early stage. He took a 
sheet of foolscap and jotted down what he thought were 
the legal propositions involved and their solutions, antic- 
ipating by his statement the final result as declared in 
my favor by the decision of the court. 

As I was wholly independent in the conduct of our 
business and as the possibilities of its growth and enlarge- 
ment revealed themselves to me, I foresaw what it was 
possible to attain by a wise use of the means within our 
reach. In a letter written by me, May 18, 1900, to the 
John Marshall Club, of Rochester, in answer to a request 
for some account of my professional life, I alluded to that 
part of my experience which related to the development 
of my business on what may be called its commercial side, 
writing in part as follows: 

"When I commenced practice the chief business of 
the profession in the City of New York was collecting 
debts for dry goods merchants and other commercial 
houses. We had our share of this business, which was 
largely carried on in the local Court of Common Pleas and 
in the New York Superior Court, of which Thomas J. 
Oakley was Chief Justice, and which obtained a high 
repute for its decisions on questions of commercial law. 

"I early formed the idea that the successful practice 
of law in our chief metropolitan center required the use, 
to a certain extent, of commercial methods, foremost 
among which were the delegation to competent subordi- 
nates of all matters not requiring the personal attention 
of the partners; the separation of moneys belonging to, 
or collected for, clients from the moneys of the firm; im- 
mediate settlement with clients for moneys received on 

214 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

their account; no accounting between partners, all sums 
received from every source being turned over to the 
cashier, by whom all disbursements were made, and divi- 
dends declared only out of ascertained profits. In addi- 
tion to these rules, another, followed with almost unvary- 
ing regularity, has been the recruiting of the partnership 
from within and not from without, so that my partners 
have been almost without exception trained in my own 
office. I do not claim any particular originality in the 
methods thus indicated, but I speak of them because they 
have proved successful in the building up of a large prac- 
tice, continuing without interruption for half a century, 
requiring the labors of six or seven partners and of three 
times as many assistants and clerks. 

"When I came to the bar there were many distin- 
guished counsel to whom the younger members of the 
profession looked up with deserved respect and it was 
considered almost indispensable to secure the aid of these 
veterans as seniors in contested cases. I found an ad- 
vantage in trying and arguing my own cases, and that in 
the court of last resort the knowledge and experience 
gained in the court below was of great advantage in the 
final argument, especially as against an opposing counsel 
brought into the case without any previous knowledge of 
it in its earlier stages. 

"As business increased we found new connections in 
banking, insurance and other corporations formed by 
our clients and opening large fields for professional activ- 
ity, while the enlarged foreign commerce of the country 
greatly multiplied cases coming within the Federal juris- 
diction. My connection with the Admiralty bar gave me 
the opportunity of aiding in establishing the jurisdiction 
of the Admiralty courts under the Constitution of the 
United States upon the basi^ of the ancient maritime law 
of continental huropc as distinguished from the circum- 
scribed statutory law ol England; and, in a series of cases 
in the Supreme Court of the United States, I succeeded in 
having the original rules of the maritime law applied in 
their integrity to the cases involved. A notable instance 

215 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

of this was the case of the 'Scotland' (105 U. S. 24), where 
an English steamer of that name had run down and sunk 
a British bark, loaded with a cargo of guano, a short dis- 
tance outside of the port of New York. Both vessels were 
destroyed by the collision. I claimed that by the mari- 
time law the 'Scotland, although in fault for the collision, 
was exempt from liability, having been herself rendered 
valueless by the disaster. The District and Circuit 
Courts decided against her owners and held them liable 
for the full amount of the loss, but the Supreme Court, on 
appeal, reversed the decree below, and applying the mari- 
time rule, held that the total loss of the offending vessel 
relieved the owners from all liability. Other cases affirm- 
ing the principle of the maritime law as a part of the 
Federal jurisprudence are the 'Lottawana ' (21 Wallace 558) 
the 'Pennsylvania' (19 id. 125) and the 'Montana' (129 
U. S. 397). 

"As counsel for many years of the Board of Commis- 
sioners of Pilots of the State charged with the licensing 
and regulating of pilots and pilotage and also with pre- 
venting encroachments on the harbor of New York, I 
was able to assist that board of State officers in the exer- 
cise of their very important powers. The act constituting 
the board provided for the election of its members by the 
New York Chamber of Commerce and the New York 
Board of Marine Underwriters, thus keeping it out of 
politics and confiding the election of its members to men 
peculiarly fitted for the discharge of such a duty. This 
somewhat anomalous mode of creating a board of State 
officers was challenged as unconstitutional, but it was up- 
held by the Court of Appeals in Sturgis v. Spofford (45 
N. Y. 446).^ 

"I have instanced the above as possessing some points 
of public interest and I might refer to many other cases 
of more or less importance; but the bulk of my pro- 
fessional service has been for private clients and in pro- 
tection of their rights and interests." 

To return to the year 1848. 

216 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Congress met for the short session in December. The 
Whig party, elated by its triumph at the polls in November, 
was as eager to gather its fruits as if the maxim "To the 
victors belong the spoils" had been of Whig instead of 
Democratic origin, and looked forward to the incoming 
administration with great expectations. In Congress 
nothing was accomplished except endless discussion and 
debate, and the 4th of March, 1849, arrived with out any 
solution of the problem affecting California and New 
Mexico. 

Soon after General Taylor had assumed the duties 
of Chief Magistrate and surrounded himself with a 
Cabinet of conservative Whigs, it became apparent that, 
although a Southern man and a slave-holder, he would 
tolerate no disloyalty to the Union or to the Federal 
government. The threats of secession and dissolution 
of the Union, with which the ultra-slavery men of the 
South filled the political atmosphere of Washington, sur- 
prised and alarmed him. He was a soldier, and a patriot, 
and he was commander-in-chief of the army and navy of 
the United States. He had no sympathy with sentiments 
or schemes which endangered the stability of the Union; 
and he gave the Southern fire-eaters distinctly to under- 
stand that he would tolerate no acts endangering the 
peace of the country, and in case of need would march at 
the head of the army to suppress any acts of violence on 
their part. 

Meanwhile the agitation of the slavery question went 
on North and South with increasing bitterness. The 

2I 7 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

"Wilmot Proviso" still held its place in the public mind, and 
the vital questions of the hour ranged themselves around 
this central point of dispute. Congress had hardly begun 
its session when Henry Clay, who had been in retirement 
since his defeat as a presidential candidate in 1844, re- 
appeared in the Senate. He signalized his entrance on a 
new period of political activity by bringing forward, as a 
cure for all the existing evils involved in the agitation of 
the slavery question, the time-worn panacea of Com- 
promise. It was his ambition to pose, in his last sen- 
atorial days, as a pacificator, on the basis of legislation 
which would end the strife between the North and the 
South. 

Mr. Clay's plan, introduced in the Senate January 29, 
1850, was broad and comprehensive. It consisted of a 
number of resolutions, each containing a proposition, 
namely: 1. That California be admitted without any 
restriction as to slavery by Congress. 2. That inasmuch 
as slavery was not likely to exist in any of the Territories 
obtained from Mexico, governments ought to be estab- 
lished there without restriction or condition on the subject 
of slavery. 3. That the boundary between Texas and 
New Mexico should be agreed upon. 4. That Texas be 
paid a sum of money in consideration of giving up a large 
part of her claims to land in New Mexico. 5. That the 
abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia under 
present circumstances was inexpedient. 6. That it was 
expedient to prevent the slave-trade in the District of 
Columbia. 7. That a more effectual fugitive slave law 

218 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

ought to be passed. 8. That Congress had no power to 
prohibit the slave-trade between slave States. 

In his speech supporting his resolutions, Mr. Clay 
took the gloomiest view of the situation caused by the 
agitation, both North and South, of the issues relating to 
slavery. The subject was, as he expressed it, an "awful" 
one, and nothing could avert the direful consequences 
which he foresaw save mutual concessions and a spirit of 
accommodations. All that was embodied in the "YVil- 
mot Proviso" would be secured to the North, because 
California had already prohibited slavery by her constitu- 
tion; it did not exist in New Mexico, nor was there any 
probability that it would ever be introduced into her ter- 
ritory. The provisions of the resolutions relating to other 
subjects conceded some things to the North and some 
things to the South. That relating to the Fugitive Slave 
Law was indispensable to secure the rights of the South 
against the deliberate refusal of the Northern States to ex- 
ecute the existing law. He threw into his impassioned 
appeal all the power and persuasive charm of his per- 
sonal magnetism, and pleaded for compromise as the only 
possible safeguard against the appalling dangers which 
menaced the Union. 

On March 4, 1850, John C. Calhoun, then in the 
last stages of his fatal illness, was brought to the Senate, 
and a speech which he had prepared was read by Senator 
Mason, of Virginia. It was the Southern statesman's 

dying appeal in behalf of slavery and the right of Southern 

slave-holders to carry their slaves into the newly acquired 

219 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

territories of the Far West. His argument was simple, 
and, to his own apprehension, conclusive. The Consti- 
tution extended over all this vast region; as the Consti- 
tution recognized and protected slavery that institution 
could go wherever the Constitution went. He claimed 
that the equality between the North and South had been 
disturbed; that the South had been gradually weakened 
while the North had advanced in power and strength, and 
that the Union could only be preserved by giving to the 
South restored equality with the North by Constitutional 
amendment, while in the meantime Congress should, as far 
as possible, redress the wrongs of the South, especially by 
enacting a more stringent fugitive slave law. He did not 
live to vote on any of the compromise measures, for, less 
than a month after his final appearance in the Senate, he 
passed away. 

Mr. Webster had not spoken. The whole country, 
especially the North, awaited the expression of his opinion 
on the compromise measures with eager and anxious ex- 
pectation. He was the foremost man in the Whig party, 
its nominee in the last presidential contest. He was the 
greatest constitutional lawyer of his time. His fame as an 
orator, established by his Plymouth and Bunker Hill ad- 
dresses and his famous reply to Hayne, was unrivaled; 
while to vast numbers of New England men he was an 
oracle of wisdom. He had strenuously opposed the an- 
nexation of Texas and the acquisition of new territory, 
either by treaty with Mexico or by conquest. He claimed 
that the "Wilmot Proviso/' prohibiting the introduction of 

220 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

slavery into newly acquired territory, had its origin in his 
own declarations on this subject. To use his own words 
it was his "thunder," and to this extent he had stood for 
all that was claimed by the North as opposed to the 
aggressions of the South. 

A few days after Mr. Calhoun's final plea for slavery 
as a national institution, Mr. Webster delivered in the 
Senate what has passed into history as his "Seventh of 
March Speech." It was known that he would address the 
Senate on that day, and the chamber — the room now 
occupied by the Supreme Court of the United States — 
was, at an early hour, crowded to its utmost capacity, on 
the floor, in the ante-chambers, and in the galleries. 1 In 
the opening sentences of his speech, Mr. Webster showed 
that he still held his accustomed mastery over the arts of 
oratory. He appealed at once to the imagination and the 
patriotic sentiments of his hearers by a lofty flight of 
rhetoric in which he depicted in vivid colors the dangers 
which threatened the imperiled Union. "The imprisoned 
winds," he said "are let loose. The East, the North and 
the stormy South combine to throw the whole sea into 
commotion, and toss its billows to the skies, and disclose 
its profcundest depths." He did not regard himself as 
fit to hold the helm in this combat with the political 
elements; but he had a duty to perform during the strug- 
gle, though the sun and the stars should not appear for 

'This debate took place before the completion of the chamlxT now occupied 
by the Senate, and in the chamUr now occupied by the Supreme t'ourt of the 
United States, from which tlx- galleries have Long since been removed.— Ed. 

221 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

many days, and he spoke for the preservation of the 
Union. 

Mr. Webster then entered upon an historical review 
of slavery in the States from the formation of the Union 
to the year 1850. He spoke of the guarantees of the Con- 
stitution by which slavery was recognized in the States 
and kept free from Federal interference, and of the great 
change of opinion which had taken place from the time 
when, both in the North and the South, slavery was 
regarded as an evil to be deplored and gradually eradi- 
cated. He attributed the growing sentiment in favor of 
slavery at the South to the extreme eagerness of the peo- 
ple not only to make the products of the soil, especially 
cotton, the means of wealth, but also to add to these 
abundant sources of prosperity by the acquisition of new 
territory. He showed that in the successful prosecution 
of this desire for extending the area of slavery the admis- 
sion of Texas added to the Union "a new slave-holding 
territory, so vast that a bird cannot fly over it in a week." 
This had been done with the aid of Northern and even 
New England votes. He, himself, had steadily expressed 
his opposition to the admission of slave States or the 
acquisition of new slave territory to be added to the 
United States, but he held that Texas being in the Union 
with all her territory as a slave State with a solemn pledge 
that south of 36 30' slavery should exist, no question re- 
mained as to slavery in that territory, and it was beyond 
the power of Congress to change the situation. 

Thus far Mr. Webster's speech had been calm and 

222 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

cogent. It laid a broad historical foundation on which he 
could have asserted the right of the North to resist by every 
means the further aggressions and aggrandizements of 
the slave power, and to uphold the principle that beyond 
the limits of the slave-holding States that power had no 
rights under the Constitution. But instead of this he 
gave his adhesion to the policy of conciliation, conces- 
sion and compromise. He held slavery to be excluded 
from both California and New Mexico by the law of 
nature and of physical geography, that the entire territory 
embraced in their borders was already "fixed for free- 
dom" and that, therefore, to apply to any part of it the 
restrictions of the "Wilmot Proviso" would be an idle 
thing; and he said, "I would not take pains uselessly to 
reaffirm an ordinance of nature nor to reenact the will 
of God. I would put in no 'Wilmot Proviso* for the 
mere purpose of a taunt or a reproach." 

Mr. Webster then went on to review the grievances 
and mutual recriminations between the North and the 
South, and laid special emphasis on the disinclination of 
the North to perform the constitutional duties in regard 
to the return of fugitive slaves, saying emphatically, "In 
that respect the South in my judgment is right, and the 
North is wrong," and he argued for the passage of a more 
stringent and effectual law in aid of the capture by 
Southern slave-holders in Northern States of runaway 
slaves. He denounced the Abolitionists as the authors, 
by continuous action since 1835, of great agitation — "agi- 
tation in the North against Southern slavery." lie 

223 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

apologized for the violence of the Northern press, which 
he attributed largely to the foolish and violent speeches 
in both Houses of Congress. The complaints of the 
North against the South he treated as having their foun- 
dation mainly in differences of opinion, in reference to 
which all that could be done was "to endeavor to allay 
the agitation and cultivate a better feeling and more 
fraternal sentiments between the South and the North." 
He closed by deprecating the Southern threat of secession, 
holding that peaceable secession of any of the States was 
impossible and could never take place. 

As fast as the telegraph and mails could carry it, Mr. 
Webster's speech was in the hands of the people North 
and South. I read it aloud at my father's breakfast table 
on the 8th of March. In the North, on the part of all the 
friends of freedom, it was received with amazement and 
indignation. It was regarded by many as a bid for the 
presidential nomination in 1852; by others as a surrender 
to the demands of the South, and by many others as a 
timorous compliance with the cry for a compromise in 
which, as always before, the South was to be the gainer 
and the North the loser. But especially and above all 
the storm of indignation was directed against Mr. Web- 
ster's advocacy of a new fugitive slave law. The im- 
prisoned winds of his opening metaphor were now let loose 
in a more literal sense, and blew "contending tempests 
on his naked head." Horace Mann wrote: "Webster 
is a fallen star! Lucifer descending from Heaven!' 1 
Giddings, of Ohio, said: "By this speech a blow was 

224 



A RETROSPECT OE EORTY YEARS 

struck at freedom and the constitutional rights of the 
free States which no Southern arm could have given." 
At a public meeting held March 25, in Faneuil Hall, to 
condemn the action of Mr. Webster, Theodore Parker 
said: "I know no deed in American history done by a 
son of New England to which I can compare this but the 
act of Benedict Arnold. . . . The only reasonable way 
in which we can estimate this speech is as a bid for the 
presidency." The Abolitionists were furious at Webster's 
denunciation of them. One of the vials of wrath poured 
out was a poem by the Quaker poet Whittier, entitled 
"Ichabod," in which he wrote, among other things: 

"Of all we loved and honored, naught 

Save power remains; 
A fallen angel's pride of thought, 
Still strong in chains. 

All else is gone; from those great eyes 

The soul has fled; 
When faith is lost, when honor dies, 

The man is dead! 

Then, pay the reverence of old days 

To his dead fame; 
Walk backward, with averted gaze, 

And hide the shame!" 

Years afterward, writing of this poem Whittier said: 
"It was the outcome of the surprise and grief and forecast 
of evil consequences which I felt on reading the 7th of 
March speech of Daniel Webster in support of the 'Com- 
promise,' and the 'Fugitive Slave Law.' Hut," he 

"5 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

added, "death softens all resentments, and the conscious- 
ness of a common inheritance of frailty and weakness 
modifies the severity of judgment." 

Mr. Webster did not flinch. After a few weeks there 
was an apparent and natural reaction of Northern senti- 
ment in his favor The conservative Whigs rallied to his 
support; men interested in the commerical interests of 
the North, who dreaded the agitation of the question of 
slavery as a menace to the prosperity of the country, 
ranged themselves on the side of compromise. On July 
17 he took the floor again in the Senate and made a labored 
speech in favor of the Fugitive Slave Law, in which he 
paid his respects to the Abolitionists as follows: "No 
drum-head, in the longest day's march, was ever more 
incessantly beaten and smitten, than public sentiment in 
the North has been, every month, and day, and hour, by 
the din, and roll, and rub-a-dub of Abolition writers and 
Abolition lecturers." 

Meantime President Taylor, who looked with dis- 
favor on the compromise measures, had been stricken 
with a fatal illness, and died July 9, 1850. Millard Fill- 
more, who succeeded to the presidency, belonged to the 
extreme conservative wing of the Whig party, and was in 
full sympathy with Mr. Clay's scheme of compromise. 
He called Mr. Webster from the Senate into his cabinet 
as Secretary of State. After long debate and discussion, 
the contest over the compromises of 1850 came to an end. 
Finally, late in August, 1850, they were passed. The 
biographer of Cass, from whom I have already quoted, 

226 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

and who claims for the Michigan Senator an important 
share in the result, says: "The different provisions of the 
compromise bill were finally passed piecemeal. Territo- 
rial governments were given to Utah and to New Mexico. 
California was admitted. Texas was given $10,000,000 
in lieu of all title to land included in the territory or- 
ganized as New Mexico. The slave-trade in the District 
of Columbia was abolished. An infamous fugitive slave 
law was passed, providing for summary proceedings and 
a shameful disregard for the rights of free blacks." ' 

This closed another chapter of compromise between 
the North and the South on the vexed question of slavery. 
Whether Mr. Clay could, without the aid of Mr. Webster, 
have carried through his scheme to the final conclusion 
reached, cannot be determined; but it is certain that the 
support which Mr. Webster gave was fatal to the latter's 
hold on the confidence and respect of a large part of the 
liberty-loving people of the North; and his latest bi- 
ographer says that in the 7th of March speech, "He 
broke from his past, from his own principles and from 
the principles of New England, and closed his splendid 
public career with a terrible mistake." 2 

'Andrew C. McLaughlin, "Lewis Cass," p. 283. 
2 Henry Cabul Lodge, "Daniel Webster," p. 323. 



227 



CHAPTER XV 

MARRIAGE — A QUAKER'S SALUTATION — REVEREND SAMUEL RUSSELL — 
WEDDING TRIP — HOME IN 37 EAST NINETEENTH STREET — DOMESTIC 
EVENTS — HORACE GREELEY — P. T. BARNUM — JENNY LIND — "BAR- 
NUM's PARNASSUS" — "SEA SCRIBBLINGS" — AMERICAN ART UNION 
— COURT OF APPEALS DECISION — "MRS. LIMBER'S RAFFLE." 

A MORNING newspaper of March 22, 1850, chroni- 
cled the fact that on the day before, the 21st, the 
ships of the Old Line of Liverpool packets were decked 
with colors in honor of the marriage of Mary Russell Mar- 
shall, third daughter of Charles H. Marshall, 1 their agent 
and part proprietor, to William Allen Butler. I cannot 
speak of the decorations of the ships from personal knowl- 
edge, but the marriage was an undoubted historical event. 

•At the time of this marriage my grandfather, Charles H. Marshall, had been 
a widower for 13 years. He had married in 1822 Fidelia, the daughter of 
Doctor Lemuel Wellman, a noted physician of Piermont, N. H., whose minis- 
trations extended far into the country and neighboring towns. My mother 
speaks of having often heard how her grandfather was wont to travel through- 
out the country on horseback with his saddle-bags filled with medicines and 
surgical instruments, relieving the sick and suffering, and attending to all forms 
of ailments, from the extraction of a tooth to the severest cases of fever and 
surgery. 

Doctor Wellman's wife — Esther Steele Russell — was a grand-daughter of the 
Reverend Samuel Russell, in whose house in 1700 the ten "reverend ministers" 
met who took the first step in the foundation of Yale College. 

The Yale Alumni Weekly of October 16, 1901, refers thus to the commem- 
oration of this event: 

"While wishing to do honor to the great men of Yale, the alumni, who have 
time, will be well repaid by a visit to the nearby town of Branford, where, in 

228 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

It took place at No. 38 East Fourteenth Street, Union 
Square. The vernal equinox never happened on a finer 
day, and its noontide sunlight, which shed its radiance on 
bride and bridegroom, was a happy presage of the kindly 
light which was to illuminate their path ever after. They 
were married by the Reverend William Snodgrass of the 
Fifteenth Street Church. He survived to be present at 
their silver wedding in 1875, but died not long after that 
event. Of the many wedding guests very few are now 
living. Some who were little children then, hardly able 
to remember the occasion, are now on the verge of old 
age, but of the older participants only a small remnant 
survive. 

I must relate a striking salutation which the bridal 
couple received from a Quaker client of mine, a shrewd 
dry-goods merchant, who, when presented to them by an 
usher, surveyed the bride, whom he had never seen before, 
and then with the utmost deliberation proceeded to say: 
"William, I think thy bride has shown more judgment 
in her choice than thee has." Fortunately, before I 

November, 1900, was placed in the public square a granite stone in memory of 
the ten reverend ministers who there met two hundred years before, to take, 
with humble faith, the first step in the founding of Yale College. The stone 
bears the name of the ten ministers with this inscription: 

" In the house of the Rev. Samuel Russell, 
Once standing near this spot, 
Was held in 1700, 
The meeting of Ministers of the 
Colony of Connecticut, 
When they gave Books for the founding 
of the Collegiate School, 
Which now bears the name of 

Yale University." — Ed. 

229 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

could turn to resent this strange declaration, he con- 
tinued as follows: " Because it takes some time to dis- 
cover thy good qualities but hers can be seen at a glance. ,, 
For genuine Quaker wit this will be found hard to match. 
On our wedding trip, which extended as far south as 
Richmond, we stopped at Washington. We called at the 
White House, and were graciously received by President 
Taylor. I had a curiosity to see the hero of the many 
victories of Mexico which had won for him the highest 
place in the gift of the country. He did not altogether 
belie his cognomen of "Old Rough and Ready," for he 
was a somewhat weather-beaten soldier. But no man 
who has had the command of armies is wholly out of 
place in any supreme position, and in his case, as with 
other military presidents, there was no violent transition 
from Major-General to Chief Executive. The interest 
of our visit was much heightened in the retrospect by the 
fact that it was only a few weeks later that he passed 
away. Mr. Webster, in his speech of the 17th of July, 
a few days after the sad event, made a fine panegyric on 
the departed President, and in alluding to the universal 
expressions of regret, ended with one of those apt classi- 
cal quotations of which he was so fond : 

"Such honors Ilium to her hero paid, 
And peaceful slept the mighty Hector's shade." 

While we were in Washington, the funeral of Mr. Cal- 
houn took place in the old Senate chamber, and we 
were present at the ceremonies, which were most impres- 

230 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

sive. The chamber was crowded with the most distin- 
guished men in the service of the country, of all parties. 
In spite of the fact that Mr. Calhoun had been during 
all his political life almost a monomaniac on the sub- 
ject of slavery and the supremacy to which the slave 
power was entitled in the affairs of the Union, he was 
held in respect for his integrity, ability and high personal 
character. 

In anticipation of my marriage, I had bought from 
William M. Evarts, whose family had outgrown it, a 
house in East Nineteenth Street, No. 37, one of a row of 
five twenty-foot front houses built by Daniel Lord, the 
eminent lawyer. One of these houses was occupied by 
his son-in-law, Henry Day, and two of them, respectively, 
by his sons Daniel D. and John C, the former of whom 
had married my sister, Mary Howard, in 1844. 

I bought the house at 37 East Nineteenth Street for 
$6,150. After living in it five years I sold it for $8,000 to 
Dr. Willard Parker, who presented it to his eldest daugh- 
ter on the day of her marriage to my brother, Benjamin 
F. Butler, Jr. My brother and his family lived in it for 
over six years, and then it was sold for $13,000; and later 
on, after some important improvements had been made 
in it, it was again sold for $33,000. The moral of this is 
that if you happen to own property in a growing part of 
the city, unencumbered by mortgage, it is best to hold on 
to it. This being an exception to the rule that "Riches 
take unto themselves wings and fly away." 

In this house our oldest child, Charles Marshall, was 

231 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

born February 24, 1851, and here he died August 19, 
1852, a bright and beautiful life cut off in less than eigh- 
teen months after its commencement. Our second son, 
William Allen, Jr., was also born in this house. 

During a part of our residence in Nineteenth Street 
our next-door neighbor was Horace Greeley, who carried 
his personal eccentricities to some extent into his domes- 
tic arrangements. He kept a goat in his back yard, and 
appealed, when necessity required, to his neighbors to 
aid him in looking after his gas meter when the lights 
went out. As the houses in our row were identical in ap- 
pearance, it was not strange that Mr. Greeley, with his 
mind intent on great affairs, should mistake one of the 
others for his own. Returning home one time carrying 
a box of tea, he made an ineffectual attempt to enter my 
house. My wife, hearing some one at the front door, 
opened it rather suddenly, and the founder of the New 
York Tribune was precipitated, tea-chest and all, into our 
front hall. 

Many years later, in the presidential campaign of 
1872, a despairing effort was made by the Democratic 
party in nominating Horace Greeley in opposition to 
General Grant. This ludicrous attempt at a change of 
front in the presence of an invincible force, resulted in 
the utter discomfiture of the veteran anti-slavery editor, 
who made but a grotesque figure as a presidential aspirant. 
From the moment when, at the close of the war, he rushed 
to Richmond to sign the bail bond of Jefferson Davis, he 
fancied himself to be the center of an influx of popular- 

232 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

ity which only wanted an opportunity to attest its power 
by elevating him to the presidency. His utter defeat at 
the polls was a rude shattering of unfounded hopes, and 
a heart-breaking catastrophe. When he died, shortly 
after his defeat, General Grant came to New York to 
attend his funeral, an act which the Tribune acknowl- 
edged as a mark of respect to a political opponent 
worthy of the magnanimous character of the man who 
paid it. It is a noteworthy illustration of the shifting 
character of our American politics that Greeley, whose 
control of the great anti-slavery organ which he founded 
made him one of the chief promoters of the Republican 
party, and an abiding force in its councils, should have 
closed a political career by an abortive attempt to secure 
the presidency as the leader of the Democratic party. 
But the good work he did against that party survives, 
and his best epitaph was found in the legend so long 
displayed at the head of the editorial columns of the 
Tribune, ''Founded by Horace Greeley." When and why 
these four words were dropped from their accustomed 
place I do not know. 

In the summer of 1850, Phineas T. Barnum, famous 
for the Museum at the corner of Broadway and Ann 
Street, which bore his name, and also famous for his man- 
agement of circuses and caravans, as shows of wild ani- 
mals were then designated, astonished the American public 
by capturing Jenny Lind, with whose praises all Europe 
was ringing, and bringing her to this country under his 
management. As she did not sing in opera, the man- 

233 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

agers of that form of entertainment could not include her 
in their arrangements, but the shrewd showman had the 
tact and courage to believe that Jenny Lind, on the con- 
cert platform, would be as attractive as in an operatic 
company on the stage. I had heard Jenny Lind at 
Exeter, in England, while on a visit to the cathedral of 
that old town. Wherever she went, she was an object 
of great interest and curiosity, and crowds would gather 
in front of her hotel, singing: 

"Jenny Lind O! Jenny Lind O! 
Come to the window! " 

But she came not, and the only way of seeing and hearing 
her was to purchase an admission ticket to the hall where 
her marvelous voice filled the place with melody and her 
hearers with delight. 

Jenny Lind's first concert was given — of all places in 
the world — in Castle Garden! It was, of course, a great 
event. I was there, and wrote an account of it for The 
National Intelligencer of Washington, for which I was an 
occasional correspondent. I think the audience hardly 
equaled in numbers Barnum's expectations, but believe 
the results of the Jenny Lind concerts, as a whole, satis- 
fied the showman. However, he afterward wisely con- 
fined himself to wild animals and the ring. 

Before her arrival, and as a characteristic stroke of 
policy, Barnum advertised a prize of two hundred dollars 
for a song, the singing of which by Jenny Lind was to be 
a feature of the opening night of her American engage- 

234 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

ment, the prize to be awarded by a committee whom he 
named. This made quite a stir in literary circles. George 
P. Morris, whose poetic reputation rested chiefly on his 
popular poem "Woodman, Spare That Tree," was at 
that time editing in partnership with Nathaniel P. Willis 
The Home Journal, then a literary weekly in New York. 
Willis gave out in the columns of that paper that "the 
acknowledged best song-writer of America" declined 
to compete for Barnum's prize. A clear field was thus 
left for all the rhymesters in the land. It was under- 
stood that Barnum took refuge from the avalanche of 
competing contributors, with which he was likely to be 
overwhelmed, by a timely arrangement with Bayard 
Taylor, who furnished what was supposed to be the suc- 
cessful song. In the mean time it occurred to me that 
some fun might be got out of the situation, and I published 
a booklet of about fifty pages under the title of " Barnum's 
Parnassus: Being Confidential Disclosures of the Prize 
Committee on the Jenny Lind Song." My venture was 
on the plan of Horace and James Smith's "Rejected Ad- 
dresses," and described the Committee as receiving and 
reading, with growing bewilderment and confusion, songs 
which were, in the main, good-natured parodies 1 on Hal- 

1 The writing of parodies was an occasional pastime with my father. " Sea 
Scribblings," as he called some light poems written on one of our European 
trips and afterwards published and sold for the benefit of a local charity, con- 
tains " Samples of Epics — Furnished 'on approbation' at the request of a lady 
who desired an Epic on the Bothnia." The samples are " I. — Classic," in style 
after Virgil; "II. — Genuine Poet Laureate," in the style of Tennyson's "Lotus 
Eaters"; "III. — Advanced Modern School;" "IV. — Latest Novelty — Patent 
Applied For." 

I have been tempted to insert some of these samples, but I am deterred from 

*35 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

leek, Bryant, Longfellow, Holmes and other bards. 
"Barnum's Parnassus'' was published by the Appletons 
and was quite a success. It went through three editions. 

In the year 1852 occurred a disastrous termination of 
The American Art Union. A few leading spirits in New 
York, enthusiastic in their efforts to aid American artists 
and establish American art on a secure foundation of pub- 
lic sympathy, had availed themselves of the charter of a 
society organized in 1840 known as the Apollo Associa- 
tion. They changed its name to The American Art Union 
and organized a plan of operations similar to that of the 
Art Union authorized by Act of Parliament in England 
and which had proved a great success. 

On my return from Europe in 1848, finding this 
movement in progress, I had united in it with much ardor, 
becoming one of the directors, and as such was associated 
with some of the leading men of the city. Amongst them 
was Charles P. Daly, Chief Justice of the Court of Com- 
mon Pleas, whose cooperation was apparently a sufficient 
guarantee of the legality of the corporation's action. 
Membership in the Art Union was secured by the pay- 
ment of an annual subscription of five dollars. The sub- 
scription money was applied to the purchase of works of 
American artists, and to the maintenance of a free gallery 

doing so by a cautionary sentence of my father's, with which he replied to a 
request to print some humorous sayings uttered at the Twelfth Night festival 
of the Century Association on January 6, 1899. The sentence appears on the 
title-page of the book printed to commemorate that occasion: " Nonsense drawn 
from the wood and consumed on the premises is a grand exhilarant. Bottling 
for export is a hazardous experiment." — Ed. 

236 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

for the exhibitions. The gallery was on the westerly side 
of Broadway in the neighborhood of Greene Street, on a 
level with the sidewalk and accessible to the entire public. 
Each subscriber was entitled to a monthly bulletin devoted 
to the interest of art, and also to one or more large sized 
engravings by American artists. At the close of each year 
the works of art were distributed by lot at the annual 
meeting among the subscribers. 

The Art Union, under its new and active manage- 
ment, proved a great success. Its list of subscribers rose 
to fifteen thousand and its ample funds enabled it to give 
to American artists a practical recognition of the most 
substantial and inspiring character. The annual meet- 
ings for distribution, held in the Broadway Tabernacle, 
then the largest auditorium in New York, were scenes of 
great enthusiasm. At one of them I recall a very neat 
bit of platform tactics by General Prosper M. Wetmore, 
the president of the society. In making the annual re- 
port he alluded to some criticism which had been made 
as to the action of the board of directors in giving a recep- 
tion in advance of the public opening of the gallery, and 
providing a collation at a cost of some three hundred 
dollars, which was claimed to be an unauthorized expendi- 
ture. He explained the necessity of interesting leading 
men of the city in the work of the Art Union and the 
advantage which had been secured by inviting them to a 
private view of the exhibition before it was thrown open 
to the public. Then, after justifying the expenditure, he 
put the question of approving the action of the directors 

237 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

to a vote. This was unanimous in their favor. When 
the applause which followed the announcement of the 
vote had subsided, General Wetmore very quietly said: 
"Well, the directors paid for that collation out of their 
own pockets." 

These halcyon days of American art were brought to 
an abrupt and stormy close. The American Art Union 
had incurred the antagonism of some dealers in foreign 
pictures and prints, and a proceeding was set in motion 
against it on the ground that its objects and methods were 
in violation of the provisions of the State Constitution 
prohibiting lotteries and the statute against lotteries and 
raffling. The fact that each subscriber became entitled 
to a share in the distribution of the property by lot was 
claimed to be of the very essence of a lottery and within 
the prohibition of the law. The American Art Union 
made a brave fight and relied as a precedent for its le- 
gality upon the English society on which it had been 
modeled. The immunity enjoyed by its English pro- 
totype, however, had been gained by a special Act of 
Parliament, a body restrained by no constitutional bar- 
riers, while in New York, from 1821 to the present time, 
the State Constitution has prohibited the Legislature from 
sanctioning lotteries. 

Setting aside, therefore, the contentions by which 
Charles O'Conor, then the foremost leader of the bar, 
sought to distinguish the scheme of the Art Union from 
one within the penalties of the law, the Court of Appeals 
pronounced its doom. The good it was doing and the 

238 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

pure motives of its promoters were fully conceded by the 
court, but there stood the Constitution and the law, and 
the fact that the scheme was wrought out by an appeal 
to the universal passion for playing at games of chance 
brought it under the ban. The court said: "The pro- 
hibition was not aimed at the object for which lotteries 
had been authorized, but at the particular mode of ac- 
complishing the object. It was founded on the moral 
principle that evil should not be done that good might 
follow, and upon the more cogent, practical reason that 
the evil consequent on this pernicious kind of gambling 
greatly overbalanced in the aggregate any good likely to 
result from it." l 

This decision was undoubtedly right. The only ex- 
cuse that can be offered for the learned lawyers, eminent 
merchants and art-loving citizens who were united in 
carrying on the good objects of the association, is that it 
never occurred to any of them in their unselfish work 
that they were violating any law. 2 

1 New York Reports, p. 237. 

2 The recollection of this controversy was undoubtedly one of the things which 
almost twenty years later caused my father to write his short story entitled 
"Mrs. Limber's Raffle, or, A Church Fair and Its Victims," first published in 
1876, and again in 1894. 

In the preface to the second edition, the auther says that the book was pub- 
lished in 1876 anonymously, "in order that the moral which it sought to enforce 
might stand on its own merits free from any element, either of strength or weak- 
ness, attaching to personal advocacy. ... A new edition of the story being 
called for, its authorship is avowed; and attention may fitly be called to the 
great advance in sound public opinion on the subject of lotteries, during the 
eighteen years which have elapsed since its first publication." — Ed. 



239 



CHAPTER XVI 

PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF 1852 — FRANKLIN PIERCE — NATHANIEL HAW- 
THORNE — CONSTITUTIONALITY OF FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW — BENJAMIN 
F. BUTLER'S ATTITUDE TO FREE SOIL PARTY — RESULT OF ELECTION — 
WORLD'S FAIR OF 1853 — CRYSTAL PALACE — DOMESTIC EVENTS — MRS. 
BENJAMIN F. BUTLER — HER ANCESTRY — LIFE — DEATH AND FUNERAL. 

THE year 1852 brought around again the presidential 
nominations and a presidential election. The Com- 
promise Measures of 1850 had been effective in lessen- 
ing the agitation in reference to the question of slavery 
in the new Territories and had been, to a large extent, 
accepted by both the Whig and Democratic parties as a 
finality so far as pending questions growing out of slavery 
were concerned. The fatally disturbing factor was the 
Fugitive Slave Law. Its inhuman provisions made it an 
abomination to every liberty-loving man in the North, to 
many of the leaders in the anti-slavery agitation, and es- 
pecially to the Abolitionists and men of extreme anti- 
slavery views, who in both the national parties had taken 
part in the Free Soil movement of 1848. The Abolition- 
ists denounced the law as unconstitutional and demanded 
its immediate repeal on that ground. Salmon P. Chase, 
whose prominence in the Buffalo Free Soil Convention 
had been supplemented by his greater prominence as a 
United States senator from Ohio, took this view, and, 

240 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

although claiming to adhere to the principles represented 
by the Democratic party, insisted that all Democrats and 
Whigs alike who had ranged themselves under the Free 
Soil banner unfurled at Buffalo, should unite in a third 
party movement to uphold the doctrines for which it 
stood. 

In the meantime, under the influence of the Com- 
promise Measures and in the belief that they afforded 
reasonable ground for supposing that the slavery agita- 
tion was virtually at an end, members of both the old 
parties had been gradually falling back into their ancient 
relations. This was especially the case in New York, 
where "Old Hunkers" and "Barn-burners" met to smoke 
the pipe of peace and renew their vows against their old 
enemies. The Democrats in turning over the State to 
Taylor and Fillmore in 1848 had necessarily given the 
ascendency to the Whigs, who were now in possession of 
all the State offices. This was gall and wormwood to 
the Democrats, and, on the basis of the Compromises of 
1850, they got together for the purpose of a continued 
attack on the common foe. Accordingly there was a 
united delegation from New York to the Baltimore Con- 
vention held June 1, 1852, in which the struggle between 
the rival candidates Cass, Buchanan, Douglas and Marcy 
ended on the forty-ninth ballot in the nomination of 
Franklin Pierce, of New Hampshire, for president, and 
William R. King, of Alabama, for vice-president. 

The nomination of Pierce, like that of Polk in 1844, 
was a surprise; but he was not without qualities appeal- 

241 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

ing to popular sentiment. He was the son of a revolu- 
tionary soldier, a graduate of Bowdoin College, Maine, 
had served in the legislature of New Hampshire for four 
years, afterwards in Congress as a representative, and 
then in the United States Senate, where he was the young- 
est man in the body. He had declined the attorney- 
generalship tendered to him by President Polk; also an 
election as United States senator for the second time, 
and the nomination for governor of New Hampshire. At 
the outbreak of the Mexican War he was commissioned a 
brigadier-general and served creditably under General 
Scott. He was a man of engaging manners and personal 
popularity. 

I well remember my father coming home one evening, 
while we were living in Washington, greatly pleased at 
being the recipient from Senator Pierce, with whom he 
had formed a pleasant acquaintance, of two volumes 
written by a New England author, a fellow-townsman in 
Concord, for whom the Senator predicted a brilliant 
literary career. These were the "Twice Told Tales" of 
Nathaniel Hawthorne, whose name is pleasantly associated 
with that of Franklin Pierce. While the latter was run- 
ning for president, Hawthorne turned his pen to the rather 
uninspiring task of writing a campaign life of the candi- 
date, a work which occupies about one hundred pages in 
one of the volumes of his complete works, and is, prob- 
ably, the least read of any contained in the collection. 
Hawthorne, who had served in the Boston custom-house 
in a subordinate position during President Van Buren's 

242 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

administration, was appointed surveyor of the port of 
Salem by President Polk in the spring of 1846, but had 
been removed in the winter of 1849. Cm tne accession of 
his friend General Pierce to the presidency he was re- 
warded by appointment to the lucrative post of consul 
at Liverpool, and was thus enabled to pursue his literary 
studies and labors in Europe, and especially in Italy, 
which became his favorite foreign abode after the ex- 
piration of his consulship. Perhaps the greatest service 
that President Pierce rendered the country was making it 
possible for Hawthorne to write "The Marble Faun," a 
book which to be fully enjoyed should be read where it 
was written, in Rome, between the Capitol and the Church 
of the Capuchins. 

The platform adopted at Baltimore was made satisfac- 
tory to the South. It upheld non-interference by Con- 
gress with slavery in the States, declared the Compromise 
Laws of 1850 a finality as to anti-slavery agitation, and 
upheld them all, including the Fugitive Slave Law. The 
Democrats of the North, who had united in the Free Soil 
movement of 1848, but who returned to their party alle- 
giance in 1852, denounced this platform; nevertheless they 
supported the nominees of the convention, in the pro- 
fessed belief that the important question of the exclusion 
of slavery from the Territories had been substantially 
settled in favor of freedom, and that the Compromise 
Measures of 1850 secured the best solution of the ques- 
tions involved in the anti-slavery agitation which it was 
possible, at the time, to obtain. 

243 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

On July 15, 1852, Mr. Chase addressed an open letter 
to my father, which was published in the newspapers and 
widely circulated, calling upon him to support the candi- 
dates who should be nominated at the approaching so- 
called Free Soil convention to be held in August. It was 
quite evident that this convention, instead of being a body 
representing, as in 1848, Whigs and Democrats united in 
opposition to the extension of slavery into free territory, 
would be controlled by the extreme anti-slavery men and 
would maintain, among other things, the unconstitution- 
ality of the Fugitive Slave Law. 

My father could not identify himself with such a move- 
ment, and he replied to Mr. Chase in a letter, published 
in the Evening Post, July 31, 1852, in which he reviewed 
with great particularity the history of the origin and pur- 
poses of the Free Soil party and avowed his adhesion to 
its principles, but declared that while he abhorred the in- 
humanity and injustice of the Fugitive Slave Law he 
could not regard it as unconstitutional or accept a plat- 
form which contained such a proposition. He held that 
the question of slavery in the Territories had, for the time 
being, been practically settled by the Compromise Meas- 
ures of 1850, and said that he desired the success of the 
Democratic candidates in order that their party might be 
charged with the entire responsibility of the government, 
it being his belief that the party would deal with the 
questions agitating the public mind in connection with 
slavery in a just and patriotic way. But he said that if 
it should lend itself to a crusade against freedom the 

244 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

duration of such misrule would be for only four years, 
which are "but as four days in the life of a nation, and 
though this period is long enough for the accomplish- 
ment of much mischief, should men in power set them- 
selves about it, yet in the virtue and intelligence of the 
people and in the favor of Providence we may confidently 
hope for an early and ample corrective." 

Pierce and King swept the country, General Scott, the 
Whig presidential candidate, receiving the electoral votes 
of only four States; and Pierce became president under 
circumstances which seemed to favor another era of good 
feeling. He was the youngest man who, up to that time, 
had been elected to the presidency, and it is said that the 
ceremony of his inauguration was witnessed by the largest 
number of people ever gathered in Washington to assist 
at the inauguration of a Chief Magistrate. The public 
interest in him was greatly heightened by the fact that in 
the month of January after his election, he lost his only 
living child, a boy of great promise, who was killed in a 
railroad accident while travelling with his father and 
mother. 

On July 14, 1853, President Pierce came to New York 
and inaugurated the "World's Fair," as it was called, 
held in a "Crystal Palace" in imitation of that erected in 
London in 185 1. He rode on horseback through Broad- 
way up to Forty-second Street and Sixth Avenue, where 
the great glass building was situated. My recollection is 
that a drenching shower, which came down upon the pro- 
cession somewhere about Eighteenth Street, compelled 

245 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

him to dismount and take refuge in a shop and procure 
some changes of raiment. At home, the day was signal- 
ized by the birth of William Allen Butler, Jr., an exhibit 
more interesting to his parents than any of the wonder- 
ful things from different parts of the globe under the 
dome of the Crystal Palace. 

The enterprise of the World's Fair was in private hands, 
and quite a fever of speculation set in for the shares, in the 
expectation of great pecuniary results. But these hopes 
were disappointed. The summer proved exceptionally 
hot, deterring strangers from coming to New York; and 
while the exhibition contained many objects of interest it 
was a failure as a financial enterprise. It now seems quite 
an insignificant affair in a retrospect which includes the 
Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia, the great exposi- 
tions of Paris and the World's Fairs at Chicago, and at 
St. Louis. 

Scarcely more than a week had elapsed from the 
opening of the Crystal Palace before my dear mother 
died, on July 22, 1853, at the house of her son-in-law, 
John P. Crosby, No. 7 Neilson Place, in the City of New 
York. She had been in failing health for several months. 
My father had sold his house in Washington Place, and 
he and my mother were making a visit to their eldest 
daughter, Mrs. Crosby, when a fatal attack of illness 
ended my mother's life. She was comparatively young, 
being only in her fifty-sixth year. She was married to 
my father at Hudson, N. Y., May 1 1, 1818, and a happy 
wedded life of thirty-five years followed the union. Of 

246 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

nine children, one, Hannah Tylee, died at Albany at the 
age of six years, and another, Susan Vanderpoel, died at 
Washington at the age of two years, while seven survived 
her: Margaret Barker, 1 wife of John P. Crosby; Har- 
riet Allen, 2 wife of Edmund Dwight; Mary Howard, 3 
wife of Daniel D. Lord; William Allen, Benjamin Frank- 
lin; 4 Eliza Ogden, afterwards the wife of Thomas S. 
Kirkbride, M.D., of Philadelphia, and Lydia Allen, af- 
terwards the wife of Alfred Booth, of Liverpool, Eng- 
land. 

My mother was of Nantucket descent on the mater- 
nal side. Her father, Howard Allen, had married Lydia 
Hussey, a native of Nantucket and a direct lineal de- 
scendant of Peter Folger, who was the most distinguished 
of the early settlers, and an ancestor of Benjamin Frank- 
lin on the mother's side. The Husseys were of the 
Quaker faith and my grandparents settled with those 
who migrated from Nantucket to Hudson, Columbia 
County, in the State of New York, planting a populous 
colony on the eastern bank of the river, whose name they 
gave to their settlement. The State of New York gave 
the newcomers a liberal charter, and as the river was 
navigable by whale ships as far up as Hudson, they trans- 
ferred to its waters the enterprise for which their island 
had been celebrated, and many vessels sailed from the 
new port in quest of spermaceti and whalebone. Hud- 
son, in due course, became the county seat, and was dis- 
tinguished by an able bar and by public men of high 

1 Died 1894. ' Died 1903. 3 Died 1880. ♦ Died 1884. 

247 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

character and great influence in the councils of the State 
and nation. 

Although my mother's family and friends were, almost 
without exception, Quakers, she withdrew from the So- 
ciety of Friends and joined the congregation in Hudson 
of the Rev. Benjamin F. Stanton, a Presbyterian clergy- 
man. He was a man of rare gifts, an eloquent preacher, 
and of an attractive personality. My father and mother 
were both warmly attached to him, not only during the 
comparatively short time they lived in Hudson after their 
marriage, but always thereafter. He was a Calvinist of 
the old school, but this ultraism in doctrine did not im- 
pair his popularity as a preacher. Indeed, it greatly 
influenced the religious opinions of his hearers. I think 
my mother never lost the impression which he made upon 
her religious nature; and my father, to the end of his life, 
adhered, I think, in the main to the doctrines preached by 
his early friend and pastor, although he would never 
accept office in the Presbyterian Church, from an un- 
willingness to subscribe to all that the Westminster Con- 
fession contained. 1 

Mr. Stanton's ministry in Hudson lasted for nine years, 
when, owing to failing health, he went first to Connecticut 
and then to Virginia and Alabama. On his return to 
the North, shortly before his death at the age of fifty-three, 
I heard him preach a sermon in the Mercer Street Church 



'It was probably for the same reason that my father likewise never accepted 
office in the Presbyterian Church, although he was numbered among its most 
devoted adherents. — Ed. 

2 4 8 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

to which I listened with the greatest interest, because his 
name had been a household word in our family for many 
years. Although there were traces of the ancient vigor 
in an occasional sentence, it was hard to believe that the 
frail figure in the pulpit before me was really the impas- 
sioned and eloquent preacher of whom I had heard so 
much from my father and mother. He died in 1843. A 
volume of his sermons was published by his widow in 
1848. 

Although my mother had left the fold of the Quakers 
for the broader pastures of the Presbyterian Church, she 
retained through all her life their steadfastness of char- 
acter. Hatred of oppression and shrewdness of percep- 
tion were ancestral traits to which she was no stranger. 
Her residence in Albany brought her into acquaintance 
with all the leading public men of the State and qualified 
her for the larger social experience in the national capital. 
The close relation in which she and my father stood to 
Martin Van Buren aided the influence of the natural gifts 
and mother wit which belonged to her in her own right. 
But the society life at Washington was not to her taste, 
and she continually urged my father's withdrawal to a 
more private sphere and the fuller enjoyment of the home 
circle in which she found her supreme delight and of 
which she was the central charm. 

At her funeral in the Mercer Street Church, on the 
Sunday afternoon following her death, the Reverend 
George L. Prentiss, D.D., then the pastor of the church, 
delivered a beautiful address. As it was extemporaneous 

249 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

I wrote it out from memory and sent my manuscript to 
Doctor Prentiss, who returned it to me unaltered with 
the exception of a single word, and with a note express- 
ing his wonder that I could so nearly reproduce his re- 
marks. He was accustomed afterwards to cite this as a 
remarkable exercise of memory, but the address so inter- 
ested me in the hearing that I retained almost exactly the 
very words in which its consoling and inspiring thoughts 
had been clothed. 

My mother now lies in our family plot in Woodlawn, 
and her grave is marked by a stone on which are engraved 
the following lines written by my father: 

"Wisely didst thou, true wife and Mother, bear 
Life's toils and trials and its follies shun; 
Fond, faithful, firm; Duty thy ceaseless aim; 
CHRIST all thy hope were every duty done. 

His was the grace that crowned thy life of love 
To him our smitten hearts entrust thee now; 

By faith we see thee with the saints above 
And to his chastening hand submissive bow." 



250 



CHAPTER XVII 

REPEAL OF MISSOURI COMPROMISE — STEPHEN A. DOUGLAS — POPULAR 
SOVEREIGNTY — KANSAS-NEBRASKA BILL — BORDER RUFFIANS — JOHN 
BROWN — "THE CRIME AGAINST KANSAS" — ASSAULT BY BROOKS ON 



SUMNER — MEETING IN BROADWAY TABERNACLE — PIERRE SOULE 
— THE "BLACK WARRIOR" EPISODE — OSTEND MANIFESTO — ANTHONY 
BURNS — THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD — "UNCLE TOM'S CABIN." 



nr^HE first meeting of Congress after the election of 
■*■ Franklin Pierce was in December, 1853. In his 
first message, the new President made fair promises in 
respect to national affairs. He congratulated the country 
on the sense of repose and security in the public mind 
which the Compromise Measures had restored. "This 
repose," he assured the people, "is to suffer no shock 
during my official term if I have power to avert it." 

The promised period of repose was of short duration 
and was broken by a rude awakening. The Southern 
leaders, emboldened by their success in 1850, and secure 
in their domination in the councils of the Democratic 
party, lost no time in setting on foot new plans in the in- 
terest of the slave power. That fateful word "Com- 
promise," linked from the beginning with the fortunes of 
slavery, was made to take on a new and portentous sig- 
nification. Ever since the year 1820 what was known as 
the Missouri Compromise had stood unchallenged on the 

251 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

national statute book. By the terms of the act of Con- 
gress which admitted Missouri as a State, slavery was pro- 
hibited north of latitude 36 30/ The territory thus pro- 
tected embraced the entire region lying west and north- 
west of Missouri, extending to the Rocky Mountains. 
Out of this territory six States have since been formed — 
Kansas, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, Mon- 
tana and Wyoming, as well as a part of Colorado. Of 
this vast region, more than ten times as large as New 
York, only a small portion was populated, and that very 
sparsely. But it had been consecrated to freedom by an 
Act which, during a period of more than thirty years, 
had been acquiesced in by the people of the entire country 
and which the North had always regarded as an impreg- 
nable barrier against any effort to engraft slavery upon 
any portion of the public domain lying north of the 
boundary line solemnly established by Congress in pur- 
suance of the Missouri Compromise. 

Soon after the opening of Congress at the end of 1853, 
and in connection with a bill for the organization of the 
Territory of Nebraska, the country was startled by the 
deliberate proposal of Democratic leaders in the Senate 
to repeal the Missouri Compromise. Stephen A. Doug- 
las, of Illinois, a bold and able politician, ambitious of 
putting himself at the head of his party, was the leader 
in this new scheme of pro-slavery aggression. It was 
largely based on the pretext that the Compromises of 1850 
had introduced a new principle with regard to the right to 
maintain slavery in the Territories of the United States, 

252 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

and that in place of restrictive regulation by act of Con- 
gress, the people of the Territories had the right to decide 
for themselves all questions pertaining to slavery within 
their borders. In other words, the entire region from 
which slavery had been excluded was now to be thrown 
open to all the slave-holders of the South and West who 
might choose to emigrate thither and plant themselves, 
with their families and slaves, upon its fertile soil. Doug- 
las christened his new doctrine by the name of "Popular 
sovereignty." His enemies dubbed it "Squatter sover- 
eignty." 

A cry of alarm and indignation went up from the entire 
North. For the first time the eyes of many who had 
sympathized with the South in its complaints against aboli- 
tionists and emancipators were opened to the true char- 
acter of the slavery propaganda, and the means by which 
they were promoting the extension of slavery. To re- 
peal the Missouri Compromise was looked upon as a 
treasonable act, and the feeling spread through the North 
that it would be in fact, as in reality it proved to be, a 
blow at the integrity of the Union and the supremacy of 
its government. 

While it is probable, perhaps certain, that Franklin 
Pierce was not "an accessory before the fact" to this in- 
famous scheme, he gave it his ready acquiescence. He 
must have known that hardly a greater shock could be 
given to the repose he had promised than by this surpris- 
ing project. It is said that after Douglas had determined 
upon his course he sought an interview with Jefferson 

253 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Davis, who was Secretary of War, and went in company 
with him to the White House to lay his plans before the 
President. This was on Sunday, January 22, 1854, and 
although it was understood that the President was strictly 
opposed to receiving visits or discussing political affairs 
on Sunday, Douglas considered the matter so urgent that 
Davis accompanied him to the Executive Mansion, and, 
after a private interview with the President, secured his 
attention to the arguments of Douglas by which the Chief 
Magistrate was won over to give his approval and to 
promise his support to the plan of repealing the Missouri 
Compromise. The historian who records the transaction 
says: "On this Sunday he had the power to fulfill the 
solemn pledge he had given the nation and its representa- 
tives; but his hankering after a renomination made him 
easily susceptible to the influences which were brought to 
bear upon him." * 

From this time till the end of May, 1854, when the re- 
peal of the Missouri Compromise was accomplished, the 
whole country was in a ferment. Both in and out of Con- 
gress public men on both sides of the absorbing question 
discussed it with unusual warmth and vehemence. Pub- 
lic meetings were held throughout the North; and memo- 
rials protesting against the threatened breach of national 
faith were poured into the Senate and House of Represen- 
tatives. Very many of the clergy throughout the North, 
who, dreading the suspicion of complicity with the Aboli- 
tionists, had hitherto shrunk from bringing politics into 

1 Rhodes, "Hist, of the United States," vol. I, pp. 437, 43& 

254 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

the pulpit, now broke away from their scruples and joined 
in these appeals for the preservation of the compact of 
1820. But all in vain. Douglas at the head of the South- 
ern Democracy and their pro-slavery allies at the North 
carried forward his scheme of legislation with a high 
hand. The original Nebraska Bill was amended so as 
to provide for the formation of the Territory of Kansas 
as well as Nebraska, the former including the territory 
bordering on Missouri and extending westward to the 
Rocky Mountains. In both of these Territories Douglas 
claimed that the people should be allowed to legislate for 
themselves upon the question of slavery, and branded the 
opposition to the measure as a "tornado" "raised by 
Abolitionists and Abolitionists alone." 

Chase, Sumner and Seward ably resisted in the Senate 
the consummation of the pro-slavery plot, and exposed 
the treachery and duplicity which characterized it. As 
spokesmen of all in the North, who without respect to 
party ties or affiliations, were opposed to the encroach- 
ments of the South, they set in array the impending battle 
between the forces of freedom and slavery. 

The Kansas-Nebraska Bill, embodying the repeal of 
the Missouri Compromise and opening the way for peo- 
pling the newly organized Territory of Nebraska by 
Southern slave-holders, was pushed through both Houses 
of Congress, and on May 30, 1854, was signed by the 
President. The first fruit of this iniquitous measure was 
the appearance of a new and unique class who have 
passed into history as "the Border Ruffians." These 

255 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

were citizens of Missouri living on or near the dividing 
line between their slave-holding State and the hitherto 
free territory of Kansas. They began in the summer of 
1854 to invade the new Territory, not for the purpose of 
permanent residence, but to overawe, outvote and out- 
fight the immigrants from western States and from New 
England. 

Largely under the influence and with the assistance of 
the Emigrant Aid Society, whose headquarters were in 
Massachusetts, many persons had flocked to Kansas to 
plant themselves there and secure its exemption from the 
blackening influences of slavery. Their intentions were 
peaceful, but were reinforced by plentiful supplies of 
Sharp's rifles, death-dealing implements well-known in the 
military vocabulary of the time. Territorial elections in 
Kansas were made to result in favor of pro-slavery candi- 
dates by the incursion of armed Missourians and their 
lawless acts of violence. At the election for a delegate to 
Congress in November, 1854, over seventeen hundred of 
these Border Ruffians rushed into Kansas and secured the 
election of a pro-slavery delegate. Later on, in March, 
1855, a similar act of invasion and violence was per- 
petrated by five thousand Missourians. Andrew H. 
Reeder, a Pennsylvania pro-slavery Democrat, who had 
been appointed the first governor of Kansas, but was too 
honest to continue long in office, stated on his return, in 
April, 1855, in a speech at Easton, Pa., that "the Ter- 
ritory of Kansas in her late election was invaded by a reg- 
ular organized army, armed to the teeth, who took pos- 

256 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

session of the ballot-boxes and made a legislature to suit 
the purpose of the pro-slavery party"; and he assured 
his hearers that "the accounts of fierce outrages and wild 
violences perpetrated at the election published in the 
Northern papers were in no wise exaggerated." ' 

From this time forth the struggle between freedom 
and slavery in Kansas went on in single-handed encount- 
ers, midnight murders, cowardly assassinations, conflicts 
between armed bands, open warfare, and the burning and 
pillaging of buildings and property owned by the settlers 
from the free States. Lawrence, their chief town (named, 
I presume, after Amos A. Lawrence of Boston, who had 
given liberally to the Emigrant Aid Society, of which Eli 
Thayer, a prominent Massachusetts Abolitionist, was the 
main promoter) was attacked by the Border Ruffians and 
suffered severely at their hands. 

At Washington, the President and the pro-slavery 
senators and representatives did their best to aid and sup- 
port the organized ruffianism of the borders, and to defeat 
the will of the permanent settlers in Kansas, while the 
Congressional debates and conflicting voices on platform 
and in the press kept alive the agitation. As the constant 
reiteration of two words "Wilmot Proviso" had marked 
the period of the long struggle over the admission into the 
Union of the territory acquired by the treaty with Mexico, 
so, during the rest of the Pierce administration, "Bleeding 
Kansas" became a household expression in all the North 
and the battle-cry in this new struggle with the slave power. 

1 Rhodes, "Hist, of the United States," vol. II., p. 83. 

257 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

In the lurid atmosphere engendered by the blood and 
carnage of the constant strife in Kansas, the name of 
John Brown appears as a red-handed avenger. He came 
from Ohio to Ossawatomie, where his sons had settled, 
and cast in his lot with the struggling settlers who were 
fighting for freedom. In May, 1856, after the attack on 
Lawrence with its consequent loss of life and property, 
Brown, who had been unable to reach the city in time to 
join in its defense, felt called upon to take revenge upon 
the pro-slavery men near his home. He seems to have 
been possessed with the insane notion that he was divinely 
commissioned to hew the Agag of slavery in pieces before 
the Lord, and, full of the ideas of Old Testament ven- 
geance, he compelled four of his five sons, a son-in-law, 
and two other men to march forth with him in the dead 
of night to capture and kill the victims of his intended 
violence. Going from house to house they seized in all 
five men, dragged them from their homes, butchered them, 
and left their dead and mutilated bodies on the highway. 
These midnight murders accomplished, Brown returned 
to his home, and it is said that when he lifted up his hand 
to ask a blessing on the morning meal it was still stained 
with the blood of his victims. Brown was execrated by 
the pro-slavery leaders, who tried to capture him; but 
he repelled their attacks and maintained his stand until 
he finally quitted Kansas to mature his larger plans for 
doing the Lord's will in the destruction of slavery. There 
is no allusion to this atrocious crime of John Brown in 
Senator Wilson's "Rise and Fall of the Slave Power in 

258 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

America," although he goes minutely into the details of 
the war in Kansas. This circumstance makes me doubt 
his entire impartiality as a historian. 

The most startling and deplorable incident of the strug- 
gle over the Kansas-Nebraska Bill in the halls of Congress 
was the cowardly and murderous assault by Preston 
Brooks, a representative from South Carolina, on Senator 
Charles Sumner of Massachusetts. When Mr. Webster 
was called by President Filmore into his Cabinet, pending 
the contest in Congress over the Compromises of 1850, 
Robert C. Winthrop was appointed by the Governor of 
Massachusetts to fill the seat left vacant in the Senate by 
Webster, for the remainder of his unexpired term. When 
the legislature of Massachusetts met early in 1851 there 
were two United States senators to be chosen: one for 
the short period still unexpired of Webster's term, and 
another for the full term of six years. After a struggle 
between Whigs, Democrats and Free Soilers and as the re- 
sult of a combination between the two last-named parties, 
Charles Sumner was chosen, April 24, for the long term. 
Robert Rantoul, Jr., was chosen for the short term. 

Sumner took his seat in the Senate in December, 1851. 
In personal appearance he was no unworthy successor in 
the Senate of Daniel Webster, whose unique and unap- 
proachable personality had been for ever withdrawn from 
that body. To a commanding presence, and features 
denoting superior intellectual power, Sumner added a 
remarkable gift of oratory and almost inexhaustible re- 
sources of learning. For some time after his entrance 

259 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

into the Senate he was on good terms with his associates 
in that body, notwithstanding the fact that he repre- 
sented extreme anti-slavery opinions and had been out- 
spoken and violent in his denunciations of the Fugitive 
Slave Law, the crowning iniquity, in his view, of the Com- 
promises of 1850. 

As the purposes and plans of the slave-holding 
oligarchy were gradually developed, and the insolent 
threats by which they were accompanied in both Houses 
of Congress became more and more intolerable, Sumner 
took up the gauntlet thrown down by the South in the 
arena of national politics. He made a deliberate attack, 
not only upon the party measure of the Democrats em- 
bodied in the Kansas-Nebraska bill, but also upon the 
chief promoters of the infamous measure, notably Andrew 
P. Butler, a senator from South Carolina, and Stephen 
A. Douglas, the Northern champion of the Southern 
scheme. 

Sumner's famous speech, "The Crime Against Kan- 
sas," was delivered in the Senate May 19, 1856. It was 
an elaborate and scathing arraignment of the Pierce 
administration for its complicity with the Border Ruffians 
by whose violence the will of the people of Kansas had 
been subverted and set aside, and contained bitter invec- 
tives against Butler and Douglas. The speech was a 
scholarly and ornate oration, as well as a thorough exposi- 
tion of the facts upon which he based his indictment of 
the perpetrators of the crime against Kansas. 

At the close of the speech there was a brief interchange 

260 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

of vehement phrases between Sumner and the senators 
whom he had especially attacked, but beyond this war of 
words there was no hostile action. Three days later, on 
May 22, Brooks committed the assault which gave his 
name its sole claim to historical memory, and which called 
forth throughout the North an outburst of horror and 
execration. 1 

It gave men a glimpse into the infernal depths of the 
slavery system, from which they recoiled with a new sense 
of shame and abhorrence. Public meetings were held in 
many places to denounce the outrage and to express sym- 
pathy with the victim, although, perhaps, the predomi- 
nant sentiment was less that of the commiseration for 
Sumner than the feeling that the blow which fell on him 
struck at the freedom of speech which, of right, belonged 
to a representative of the people. 

I was active in arranging a meeting in New York, held 
in the Broadway Tabernacle, at which men of all shades 
of political opinion united in condemning, by speech and 
resolution, the dastardly act which was the occasion of 
their coming together. I recall particularly the impas- 
sioned address by Daniel Lord, then one of the foremost 
leaders of the bar, a Whig in politics, a conservative in 
feeling, and far removed from any sympathy with the 
Abolitionists. He spoke with a force and fervor which 
deeply stirred his audience, and in describing the char- 
acter and accomplishments, and the claims to admiration 

1 For a full and graphic description of this assault, see Rhodes, "History of 
the United States," vol. II, pp. 139-140. 

26l 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

and respect which belonged to Charles Sumner, he made 
the brutality of the assault to stand forth in vivid colors. 
Meanwhile the Democrats in both the Senate and 
House of Representatives did their best to prevent any 
condemnation of Brooks or of Keitt, who was also con- 
cerned in the assault and the events growing out of it. 
The Senate committee, composed wholly of Democrats, 
who investigated the affair, reported they could do nothing 
except to report the facts to the House of Representatives. 
The House committee, of whom three were Northern 
men of anti-slavery opinions, and two Southern Demo- 
crats, made a majority report censuring Brooks and recom- 
mending his expulsion, while the minority denied any 
jurisdiction by the House to punish a member for an act 
done in the Senate chamber. The resolution of expulsion 
failed for want of a two-thirds vote, while that of censure 
was passed, both as to Brooks and Keitt, who thereupon 
resigned their respective seats, went home to their dis- 
tricts in South Carolina, and were immediately returned 
by their constituents to the House of Representatives. 
Brooks was lauded and applauded with great unanimity 
by the Southern men of his party. He was feasted and 
toasted and made the recipient of innumerable marks of 
respect and tokens of admiration, especially in the form of 
canes inscribed in honor of his valiant achievement. It 
is significant that one of the men who united in this tribute 
to the assailant of an unarmed and defenseless Senator 
was Jefferson Davis, the master spirit of the pro-slavery, 
anti-Kansas cabinet of Pierce. The constituents of 

262 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Brooks entertained him at a banquet to which they in- 
vited Davis, who replied in a letter in which he held 
Brooks up to the sons of South Carolina as one who 
"has been the subject of vilification, misrepresentation 
and persecution because he resented a libelous assault 
upon the representative of their mother." x 

Sumner did not regain his health sufficiently to resume 
permanent labor in the Senate until after a long interval of 
time, during which he made several visits to Europe for 
medical treatment and necessary rest. Once or twice he 
assayed to take up his senatorial duties, but was com- 
pelled to abandon them. Finally, after submitting to 
most heroic treatment at the hands of Dr. Brown-Sequard 
at Paris, he returned home November 21, 1859, restored 
to a sufficient measure of health to enable him to resume 
his seat in the Senate, to which Massachusetts had re- 
elected him in 1857, notwithstanding his continuing dis- 
ability. He held it uninterruptedly until his death, 
March n, 1874. Both Senator Butler and Representa- 
tive Brooks, whose names are irrevocably linked with 
that of Sumner, died early in the year 1857, while Keitt, 
who was associated with Brooks in the attack on the 
Massachusetts Senator, subsequently took up arms against 
the Union and perished in the conflict. 

Charles Sumner was one of the ablest, boldest and 
most aggressive of the anti-slavery leaders. In public 
office, as well as in private life, his efforts, always based 
on his convictions of right and duty, were somewhat 

• Henry Wilson, "Rise and Fall of the Slave Power," vol. II, p. 489-490. 

263 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

marred by his overweening self-confidence and self-as- 
sertion. He was quite intolerant of opinions at variance 
with his own. I recall an evening which I spent at his 
apartments in Washington before he had purchased his 
house on the corner of Vermont Avenue and H Street, 
now a part of the Arlington Hotel. He then poured forth 
a stream of invective against the Lincoln administration, 
which had fallen under his displeasure for various acts 
that he denounced with great vigor. But he was a true 
patriot, and few men have given their lives with more 
devotion to the service of their country. 

Beside the infamy of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, and 
the repeal of the Missouri Compromise, the Pierce ad- 
ministration is chargeable with repeated and persistent, 
although abortive, attempts, continued during several 
years, to secure the annexation of Cuba to the United 
States. Slavery existed in the island, and the Southern 
slave-holders looked with longing eyes upon a territory 
out of which two and perhaps three Slave states could be 
created, giving to the South advantages equal, if not 
superior, to those which had been gained by the acquisi- 
tion of Texas. Even Governor Marcy, who had been 
Secretary of State from the accession of Pierce to the 
presidency, favored the project, and it was promoted with 
special zeal by Jefferson Davis, Pierce's Secretary of War. 

Pierre Soule, of Louisiana, a leading Southern Demo- 
crat and a typical fire-eater, as the extreme Southerners 
were often called, was appointed minister to Spain, with 
authority to negotiate for the purchase of Cuba. Soule 

264 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

was of humble origin, and had been forced to leave France 
on account of his political opinions. 1 Spain had no more 
intention then of parting with the "ever faithful Isle" 
than she had later of yielding to the demands of the United 
States in aid of her oppressed subjects; and Soule soon 
found out that Cuba was not for sale. He made himself 
unpleasantly notorious by forcing the Marquis de Turgot, 
the French ambassador, into a duel with pistols, after the 
Marquis had previously fought a duel with swords with 
his son, Nelville Soule. The wrong thus doubly avenged 
was an alleged insult to Madame Soule at a ball given by 
the Marquis de Turgot in honor of the fete-day of the 
Empress Eugenie, whose mother, the Countess of Mon- 
tijo, was paramount in her influence at the Spanish 
Court. 

At this second duel, on which Soule insisted, on the 
ground that the insult to his wife took place at the house 
of the Marquis de Turgot and admitted of no explanation, 
he demanded that the distance between the combatants 
should be ten paces. Turgot's second, Lord Howden,who 
was at that time the English ambassador to Spain, refused 
this demand and insisted that the distance should be in- 
creased to forty paces. Soule declared that this would 
make the duel a farce, but it proved sufficiently serious to 
the Marquis de Turgot, for at the second shot Soule's ball 
struck him in the leg above the knee, causing a lameness 
from which he never recovered. Unlike the first duel 
the second ended without any reconciliation. 

1 Rhodes, "History of the United States," vol. II, p. 13. 

265 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Notwithstanding these escapades, Soule was allowed 
to remain at the Spanish Court and watched his oppor- 
tunity, in the disturbed state of political affairs then exist- 
ing in the Peninsula, for something which might aid in 
the acquisition of Cuba by fair means or foul. By a 
special piece of good luck, as it seemed to him, an occasion 
offered for bringing Spain to terms. The Cuban custom- 
house authorities had seized and detained at Havana the 
steamer Black PFarrior, a merchant vessel plying between 
Mobile and New York, which, in her regular trips, touched 
at Havana but discharged no cargo there. She had pur- 
sued this course for thirty-six consecutive voyages, her 
cargo being always permitted to pass unmolested by the 
customs officers at Havana. Suddenly on Feburary 28, 
1854, she was detained on a charge of violating the regu- 
lations of the port. The vessel and cargo were seized 
and confiscated. This was a serious wrong on the part 
of the customs authorities, and justified the United States 
Government in demanding reparation and indemnity for 
the owners of the vessel. Soule was authorized by the 
State Department to make a formal demand on the Span- 
ish Government for prompt action on their part to re- 
dress the outrage. 

But Soule saw in this incident a casus belli, and, going 
beyond his instructions, was as peremptory and unflinch- 
ing in his communications with the court as he had been 
with the Marquis de Turgot. Soule was especially dis- 
liked by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Senor Calderon, 
with whom, while the latter was Minister from Spain to 

266 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

the United States, Soule had quarreled in Washington. 
Calderon probably suspected that Soule was exceeding 
his instructions, for after a correspondence which resulted 
in Soule's being foiled in his effort to embroil the United 
States in a war with Spain, he was forced to abandon his 
belligerent attitude; and the Black Warrior affair was 
satisfactorily settled without his aid by negotiations at 
Washington. A war with Spain meant the speedy and 
certain acquisition of Cuba; and Soule, with the extreme 
Southerners, of whom he was the representative, had 
seized on the Black Warrior incident as affording a pre- 
text for a war with Spain at a time when both France 
and England were engaged in the Crimean War, and 
unable to come to her assistance. 

As no one in the North wanted Cuba, or a war with 
any European power, the administration, even with the 
help of the Soule gasconadings, could not make out of 
the Black Warrior case a grievance that called for a hostile 
attitude against Spain. 

Meanwhile, in the Southern States, under color of the 
Black Warrior affair, a filibustering expedition to aid in 
the conquest of Cuba was set on foot. This was assisted 
by rumors of an impending revolution in Cuba on the 
part of the Creole inhabitants for the purpose of throwing 
off the Spanish yoke. 

General Quitman, who had been governor of Missis- 
sippi and was closely allied to Jefferson Davis, was the 
prime mover in the scheme, and expected to be the leader 
of the forces raised in the South and destined for Cuba. 

267 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

He had been in Washington, made no secret of his plans, 
and had the sympathy of many Southern representatives 
and some members of the cabinet. The proposed expe- 
dition was, of course, a lawless one, directly in the teeth 
of the neutrality laws which made all such attacks upon a 
friendly power criminal offenses. Quitman's project 
could not long be kept in the dark. Northern sentiment 
was, of course, outspoken against it, and at last the South- 
ern sympathizers with the movement were forced to yield. 
The President, perhaps reluctantly, performed the plain 
duty of issuing a proclamation denouncing the plans of 
the filibusters as contravening the neutrality laws and 
providing for their strict enforcement. So it came about 
that Quitman, insisting on leading his battalions against 
Cuba, was arrested and put under bonds to observe the 
neutrality laws; and the wresting of the "Pearl of the 
Antilles" from the Crown of Spain by the force of arms 
was ingloriously abandoned. Nevertheless the Pierce ad- 
ministration and the Southern slave-holders by no means 
relinquished their efforts to obtain the coveted prize. 

Although the rumored outbreaks in Cuba had no ex- 
istence, a real revolution had occurred in the capital, and 
new political conditions prevailed. Hoping to take ad- 
vantage of this altered state of affairs, in August, 1854, 
our government appointed a commission consisting of 
Soule, James Buchanan (then Minister to England) and 
John Y. Mason, of Virginia, to consider the acquisition 
of Cuba. The State Department had desired the con- 
ference to be informal and without publicity, but Soule, 

268 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

true to his braggadocio methods, soon made Europe and 
America aware of the mission with which his confreres 
and himself were charged. The three gentlemen met 
at Paris, but after a short stay there they adjourned to 
Ostend, and after three days' deliberations at that place 
went to Aix-la-Chapelle, where they formulated their 
views in a document that became famous as the " Ostend 
Manifesto." 

This was a most amazing and unprincipled decla- 
ration of the right and duty of the United States to 
possess herself of Cuba by force, in case Spain should re- 
fuse to sell the island for a price far beyond its value, the 
amount of which was left blank in the original document 
but understood to have been agreed upon by its authors 
as one hundred and twenty million dollars. The refusal 
of this offer by Spain would leave Cuba a source of such 
continuous danger as to justify the United States, by 
every law human and divine, in wresting it from Spain. 
The manifesto goes on to say: "We should be recreant 
to our duty, be unworthy of our gallant forefathers, and 
commit base treason against our posterity, should we per- 
mit Cuba to be Africanized and become a second St. Do- 
mingo, with all its attendant horrors to the white race, 
and suffer the flames to extend to our neighboring shores, 
seriously to endanger or actually to consume the fair fab- 
ric of our Union. We fear that the course and current 
of events are rapidly tending toward such a catastrophe." 

It seems almost incredible that three sane men, all 
versed in public affairs, and one of them soon to become 

269 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

President of the United States, should have deliberately 
set down in black and white the wild and scandalous 
proposition contained in the "Ostend Manifesto." It 
was undoubtedly the work of Soule, who is supposed to 
have coaxed and cajoled his colleagues into signing it. 
He forwarded the document to the State Department, ac- 
companied with a letter urging the immediate seizure of 
Cuba at the present opportune moment when she could 
not hope for aid from England or France. But in his 
zeal he had overshot the mark. Secretary Marcy had 
not lost his senses, nor had he ever intended to run the 
risk of a war with Spain for the sake of Cuba, and he 
was evidently tired of the bombast of Soule. The "Os- 
tend Manifesto" was not endorsed by the administration. 
Marcy's acknowledgement of its receipt was a rebuff re- 
ceived by Soule with an amazement and an indignation 
that were not diminished when the Spanish Minister of 
Foreign Affairs declared in the Cortes that for Spain to 
part with Cuba would be a stain on the national honor. 
This sentiment was greeted with popular enthusiasm and 
effectually closed the door to any negotiations for the sale 
of Cuba to the United States. Soule resigned as Minister, 
and Spain held Cuba for more than forty years, and until 
the atrocities of her later sway over the island forced the 
United States into the war of 1898, which, on just grounds 
of humanity, put an end to Spanish rule on Cuban soil. 
In May 1854, an object lesson of New England hatred 
of the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850 was given in Boston 
in connection with the capture, and the return to slavery, 

270 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

of Anthony Burns, a runaway slave whose master had 
pursued him to Boston and there put him under arrest 
and carried him before a United States commissioner. 
This was in accordance with the provisions of the Con- 
stitution and Fugitive Slave Law. There was no ques- 
tion as to the identity of Burns, and on proof of the facts 
it was the duty of the commissioner to give up the slave 
to his master. Richard H. Dana, Jr., a leading Boston 
lawyer, son of the poet and the author of "Two Years 
Before the Mast," volunteered his professional aid; but 
Burns avowed his conviction that it was of no use to resist. 
His remonstrances, however, did not avail. The oppor- 
tunity for an open revolt against the infamy of the Fugi- 
tive Slave Law was too tempting. It was not so much 
that Anthony Burns was about to be remitted to all the 
cruelties of slavery by the execution of that abhorrent 
law, as that the soil of Massachusetts had been made the 
hunting-ground of a slave-owner. 

All Boston was aroused. A mass meeting was held in 
Faneuil Hall and inflammatory speeches were made by 
Wendell Phillips .and Theodore Parker. A mob sur- 
rounded the court house in which Burns was confined. 
One man was killed and another wounded in the melee 
which followed the attempt at rescue, and the excitement 
in and around Boston betokened a general popular up- 
rising. The police of Boston, a special posse comitatus in 
aid of the marshal, the Massachusetts militia and other 
troops were called into requisition. President Pierce sent 
a message declaring that the law must be enforced, and 

271 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

the unfortunate fugitive was marched from the court 
house, where he had been condemned to be returned to 
slavery, to the revenue cutter which was waiting at the 
wharf to receive him, in the presence of fifty thousand 
people and under a strong military escort. 

This violent outburst of wrath in Massachusetts was 
an indication of the state of feeling in the North of which 
the South might well have taken note. If the object had 
been simply to rescue Burns, his master might have been 
tempted by a large sum to part with his slave, but it does 
not appear that any attempt was made to secure the 
freedom of Burns by purchase. The only money item 
that appears in the history of the incident is that of the 
cost to the government of his rendition. This is var- 
iously computed from $40,000 to $100,000. The signifi- 
cance of the popular uprising was the detestation which 
the citizens of the North had come to feel against slavery 
itself as a moral evil, and a curse from which the coun- 
try should be delivered. If these things were done in the 
green tree, what would be done in the dry? The time 
was not long distant when this question was to be an- 
swered in blood. 

The Burns incident and the increasing outbursts of 
Southern defiance in Congress fastened the attention of 
the North on the aggression of the slave power with 
steadily increasing interest. "The Underground Rail- 
road," as it was called, an organized method of aiding 
the escape of slaves and sending them from point to point 
through the Northern States to Canada, became more ac- 

272 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

tive in its operations, and a powerful impetus to anti- 
slavery sentiment had been produced by the publication 
and sale of "Uncle Tom's Cabin," by Harriet Beecher 
Stowe, a sister of Henry Ward Beecher, the famous pastor 
of Plymouth Church in Brooklyn. 

This remarkable work first appeared as a serial in 
the National Era, published at Washington. It at- 
tracted comparatively little attention until it was pro- 
duced in book form. "Uncle Tom's Cabin" is one of the 
classics of the literature of the anti-slavery struggle. 
Longfellow published a little volume entitled "Poems 
on Slavery"; the Quaker poet Whittier blew occasional 
blasts from his silver trumpet, deploring the defection 
of recreant leaders and heralding the praises of the stead- 
fast champions of freedom; and Doctor Channing, the 
celebrated Unitarian minister, was not wanting in vig- 
orous onslaught against slavery. Great speeches by 
Seward, Chase and Sumner in the Senate or on the stump 
commemorate their forensic abilities and patriotism. 
But no sermon, song or speech of that eventful period 
wrought its way into the popular hearts or stirred the 
sympathies of liberty-loving people as did "Uncle Tom's 
Cabin." It told the story of the shame and wrong of 
slavery as it never had been told before, and poured a 
flood of light into the darkest corner of infamy. There 
never was a more remarkable instance of the power of 
fiction, aided by genius and inspired by a high moral 
purpose, to arouse the world for the destruction of a 
gigantic wrong. 

273 



CHAPTER XVIII 

"NOTHING TO WEAR" — ITS GENESIS — PUBLICATION AND POPULARITY — 
A SCHOOLGIRL CLAIMANT — REVIEWS — LITERARY WORK FOR HARPER'S 
— LETTER FROM GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS — REVIEW BY WILLIAM D. 
HOWELLS — THE POEM. 

I FIND among my father's papers a draft of a letter, 
dated March 28, 1857, to Henry D. Gilpin, his warm 
personal friend and his successor in the office of Attorney- 
General in the Cabinet of Mr. Van Buren, in which he 
writes : 

"I enclose a slip from Harper s Weekly containing 
a hit at the times which my son Will lately threw off, 
which may amuse Mrs. Gilpin." This "hit at the times" 
was "Nothing to Wear," a poem sufficiently well-known 
at the present time to require no special introduction to 
my grandchildren or to any other readers of this page. 
I confess that I have sometimes felt a pang, or at least a 
thrill, of mortification that, after many years of toil to 
attain a desired place in my profession, my chief, if not 
only, claim to public recognition has been the writing of 
a few pages of society verse. But a lawyer's repute is 
among the most evanescent of unstable things; and unless 
he has the good fortune to connect himself with some- 
thing outside of his calling which attracts the popular 
gaze, his "name is writ in water." During the two 

274 



A RETROSPECT OE EORTY YEARS 

score and more years since the first appearance of the 
poem I have been asked, I do not know how many times, 
why I happened to write it and what gave me the idea 
and motive. 

The genesis of "Nothing to Wear" was in this wise. 
Both in my father's family and that of my wife the male 
sex were in the minority. Of my father's children, two 
were sons and five were daughters, while Captain Mar- 
shall's included only one son and four daughters. It was 
natural, therefore, that in our reunions personal topics, 
near and dear to the feminine heart, should have been 
frequently prominent. Thus in the course of time the 
phrase "nothing to wear" in connection with proposed 
entertainments or social festivities became familiar to my 
ear; and the idea occurred to me that it might be used 
effectively as the text of a good-natured satire against the 
foible of the gentler sex of which it was so often the ex- 
pression. 

At first, the plan of treatment which I projected was 
to present a series of pen pictures of unfortunates, in 
various situations, under disabilities produced by the 
fancied inadequacy of their wardrobes, but I soon aban- 
doned this idea and cast the poem in the mould in which 
it finally appeared in print. A little judicious observa- 
tion, supplemented by information gathered in the home 
circle, gave me the names and descriptions of the fash- 
ionable articles of apparel needed in depicting the plight 
of "Flora M'Flimsey," while the catalogue of cases of 
destitution was modeled after the manner of the reports 

275 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

of charitable institutions devoted to the relief of poverty. 
The idea of giving a moral turn to the subject did not 
occur to me until I had made considerable progress in 
my work on the poem, which occupied odd moments of 
leisure in a very busy winter. I was living with my wife 
and two children in Fourteenth Street, occupying the 
house of my father-in-law during his absence on a South- 
ern tour, and I remember that it was while I was walking 
one evening in a neighboring street that the thought 
expressed in the closing lines of "Nothing to Wear" 
came to me, a sudden, and, I must believe, a genuine 
inspiration. 

Having finished the poem, and after reading it to my 
wife, I took it one evening to my friend Evert A. Duyck- 
inck, whom I found in his accustomed place in the base- 
ment of his house No. 20 Clinton Place, surrounded by 
the books which afterwards, under his will, went to the 
Lenox Library. I read him the poem, to which he lis- 
tened with lively interest; but, much to my disappoint- 
ment, he did not appreciate as keenly as I had hoped, 
what I believed and what afterwards proved to be, the 
elements of its popularity. While Duyckinck was the 
most genial of companions, and the most impartial of 
critics, he was too much of a recluse, buried in his books, 
almost solitary in his life, and entirely removed from the 
circle of worldly and fashionable life, to judge of my work 
as a possible palpable hit. However, he immediately 
possessed himself of it for publication in Harper's 
Weekly, then recently started, and I at once acquiesced, 

276 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

making the single condition that they should publish it 
in columns wide enough to prevent breaking of the lines. 
No thought of securing the copyright or of retaining any 
control in reference to the publication of it occurred to 
me, and the check for fifty dollars which in due course I 
received from the Harpers, represented the entire pecu- 
niary benefit that ever came to me from "Nothing to 
Wear." 

The poem as it went to the Harpers contained 305 
lines. When I received the proof sheets they were ac- 
companied by a note stating that the addition of 24 lines 
would fill out the last page, and I wrote the required 
number, inserting them in the body of the poem, which 
appeared very handsomely printed in the number of 
Harpers Weekly for February 7, 1857. I very soon 
found that in venturing to shoot folly as it flies I had hit 
the mark. "Nothing to Wear" was taken up by the 
press, and, without objection on the part of the Harpers, 
was reprinted in newspapers all over the country. In 
England it was quite as popular as in this country. It 
was published in book form in London by Sampson, 
Low & Co., who, in their preface, say that it had achieved 
in America a popularity as great as that achieved in Eng- 
land by Hood's "Song of the Shirt." It appeared also 
in various English magazines and newspapers. Harriet 
Martineau, in an article on "Female Dress" in the West- 
minster Review, then, more than now, a foremost organ 
of English public opinion, quoted it entire, and it thus 
found a place in a leading English quarterly, a compli- 

2 77 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

ment never before, I believe, accorded to an American 
author. Charles Sumner, who was in Europe at the 
time, sent me a copy of the French prose translation, 
which contained a curious note in reference to the "Mrs. 
Harris" spoken of in the opening lines as "famous in 
history." In utter ignorance, apparently, of Dickens's 
immortal creation, the translator stated that the reference 
was to a lady who had lost her life by an accident at 
Niagara Falls. A German translation in verse, with 
illustrations, appeared in the Almanach de Gotha. 

On the basis of this widespread popularity I asked 
Fletcher Harper, who was my particular friend in the 
publishing firm, to bring out the poem in a volume, but 
he was unwilling to take the risk, saying that he had sold 
80,000 copies of the Weekly which contained it and that 
there would be no demand for the book. So sincere was 
he in this belief that when the firm of Rudd & Carleton, 
composed of two young men who were just embarking in 
business as publishers, asked leave of the Harpers to pub- 
lish "Nothing to Wear," their request was granted with- 
out any consultation with me. Rudd & Carleton pub- 
lished "Nothing to Wear" in a rather attractive form 
with illustrations by Augustus Hoppin, a well-known 
artist. They afterwards claimed, I believe, to have sold 
twenty thousand copies, and it was understood that the 
success of the book materially aided the building up of 
the business of the new firm. No benefit, however, 
accrued to me. 

I made a mistake in publishing "Nothing to Wear" 

278 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

without giving my name to the world as its author. It 
appeared anonymously, as was very generally the cus- 
tom at that time in respect to articles in magazines and 
periodicals, except in the cases of writers whose names 
were exceptionally well known. I feared that if I were 
known to be a writer of verses, it might injure my stand- 
ing as a lawyer. Members of my profession were per- 
mitted to make politics an adjunct of their practice at the 
bar, but dalliance with the Muse and dabbling in verses 
were apt to come under the ban of a commercial client- 
age. Public opinion has undergone a change in this re- 
gard in the later years of the century, and I think that I 
may not unjustly claim some share in so modifying it 
that a lawyer may now make excursions into the fields 
of literature without forfeiting the confidence of the pub- 
lic in his ability to deal with the weightier questions of 
the law. The penalty which I paid for this overcaution 
was that the authorship which I did not avow was open to 
adverse claims, and an absurd story was started that a 
girl of fifteen had reported to her family in their suburban 
home that she had written the first nine lines and thirty 
out of the concluding portion, and that the whole body of 
the poem (290 lines) had been interpolated by another 
hand ; that while on a visit to New York she had dropped 
the manuscript, and shortly after discovered the missing 
lines as published in "Nothing to Wear." 

The tale, substantially as told by the child's father, 
was as follows: "My daughter, about a year ago, in a 
ramble through the woods near the house where I reside, 

279 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

accidentally tore the skirt of her dress. This incident 
caused her to exclaim, perhaps with some vexation, 
'There, now I have nothing to wear!' and this exclama- 
tion was succeeded by the reflection, 'How many are in 
the habit of declaring that they have nothing to wear, who 
really have no just reason for the complaint, while, on 
the other hand, multitudes might make the same com- 
plaint with truth, as well as sorrow!' He goes on to 
say that "three fragments, the first consisting of nine, the 
second of twenty-four, and the third of six lines were 
written by her on the same sheet of paper and subse- 
quently brought by her on a visit to this city (New York). 
She had the manuscript in her hand on leaving the cars 
near Twenty-sixth Street, and passing through the crowd 
it was lost." 

The claim thus put forth in behalf of this juvenile as- 
pirant, compelled me to disclose my authorship, which 
I did by the publication of a card stating in the most 
explicit and unmistakable terms that every line and word 
in "Nothing to Wear" were original with me and brand- 
ing the claim as utterly false. My neighbor, Horace 
Greeley, in a Tribune editorial, exposed the absurdity, 
telling me after its publication that he knew enough of 
the plagiarisms of school girls to account for it. Har- 
per s Weekly also exposed it as a manifest fraud, point- 
ing out that although the poem was published in Feb- 
ruary, the spurious claim was not put forth until July. 
Messrs. Rudd & Carleton lost no time in availing of the 
ripple of excitement caused by this incident as a means 

280 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

of floating their edition of "Nothing to Wear" into in- 
creased popularity, and they rang the changes upon the 
pretensions put forward in behalf of the supposed girl 
author in sensational advertisements, and by thus fanning 
the flame gave to her a transient notoriety. 

After all, my experience was not an uncommon one 
in the annals of literature. Ever since Bathyllus lived 
to filch the verses of Virgil, the anonymous author has 
been pursued by thieving marauders. A case closely re- 
sembling mine was that of Henry Mackenzie, author of 
"The Man of Feeling," a popular English novel published 
in 1 77 1. He was a barrister devoted to his profession; 
and, actuated by the same dread of injuring his prospects 
as a lawyer that prevailed with me, he gave his book to 
the world anonymously. Shortly after its appearance, a 
Scotchman named Eccles copied the whole book with 
his own hand and with unblushing effrontery asserted 
that he was its author and produced the manuscripts in 
proof of his claim. Mackenzie was thereby compelled to 
come forward, avow his authorship and expose the im- 
poster. 

The power of the poem is, as I have always thought, 
in the moral it pointed, which, coming after the light 
treatment of the subject preceding the closing lines, was 
invested with something of the element of unexpectedness. 
This view was very generally expressed by critics and 
reviewers. I find a single exception, in a notice of the 
poem by a French reviewer, M. Etienne, who, while re- 
garding it as a genuine example of American humor, 

281 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

proceeds to make known his dissent from its moral tone 
as follows: "When I read these words I still admire; I 
recognize a noble and high-toned accent of satire; but 
the human has taken wings. I am brought back against 
my will to the memory of those old Puritans who founded 
the American nation. The idea of damnation dissipates 
all my gayety, and I look to see if I have really before me 
a humorist or a son of Calvin." 

The Harpers, finding that the publishing of "Nothing 
to Wear " by Rudd & Carleton had not exhausted the 
public interest in it, reprinted it in the November number 
of their magazine with illustrations by Hoppin, and also 
shortly afterwards published it in a handsomely printed 
book, edited by Evert A. Duyckinck and entitled "Eng- 
lish and American Poets." They were very anxious for 
me to connect myself permanently with their house as one 
of its literary staff, and I was induced, for a short time dur- 
ing the temporary withdrawal of Francis Tomes, to write 
for Harper s Weekly the column headed "Chat." In 
the summer of 1857 I was confronted with a much more 
formidable project of their devising. My friend George 
William Curtis, who had written "The Easy Chair" for 
Harper s Monthly with great acceptance to the publishers 
and the public, was drawn away from the Harpers to take 
the editorship of Putnam's Monthly. Fletcher Harper 
immediately proposed that I should occupy the vacant 
chair, and would not take "No" for an answer. The 
permanent connection with the Harpers that would have 
followed a compliance with their invitation was out of 

282 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

the question. It occurred to me, however, that in all 
probability Putnam's Magazine would prove a finan- 
cial failure, and in that event Curtis would not only lose 
his place as editor, but would be unable to resume "The 
Easy Chair" if it were filled by a literary man dependent, 
to a greater or less degree, on its retention. It would, 
therefore, be an act of friendship to him if I should keep 
the chair warm for his benefit pending the result of the 
enterprise in which he had embarked. Accordingly I 
told Fletcher Harper that I would assume the editorship 
of "The Easy Chair" temporarily, with the intent of vacat- 
ing it in Curtis's behalf should the forebodings of my 
prophetic soul touching his new relations be verified. 
He hesitated to commit himself to reinstating an editor 
who, as he thought, had forfeited his right of return, but 
I insisted and the publishers yielded. For several months 
I acted as the locum tenens in the editorship of "The 
Easy Chair." As I had anticipated, the publication of 
Putnam's Magazine was suspended, and Curtis was 
delighted to find that I was not only willing to retire in 
his favor, but that my motive in assuming his post was, 
in fact, for his own benefit. 

It is, perhaps, the pleasantest recollection of that part 
of my life which threw me into relations with publishers 
and authors that I was able to reunite the Harpers 
to the most gifted and accomplished writer that ever 
wielded his pen in their service. Their close relations 
with Mr. Curtis, thus resumed, continued till his death 
in 1892. 

283 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Here is the note in which, with characteristic grace of 
feeling and expression, he acknowledged the service I 
had rendered: 

New York, 12 Oct., 1857. 

My Dear Sir: 

Mr. Fletcher Harper showed me long ago a courteous 
and considerate note you had written him offering to re- 
linquish the Easy Chair to the battered hulk that had 
preceded you in it, and that, dismantled in the storm, was 
glad to slide back into so soft a haven. Ever since then I 
have been meditating a note that I was to write you and 
the meditation has kept the memory so fresh and pleasant 
that I have been in no hurry to write the note. 

Yet you see here it is. It merely makes a bow and 
thanks you; and, for my own part, I feel very sure the 
meditation will not end now that the note is written. 

Faithfully yours, 

George William Curtis. 

[In a notice of my father's collected poems, as pub- 
lished by the Harpers in 1899, Mr. William D. Howells 
gives a retrospective review of ''Nothing to Wear" and 
presents its claims to a permanent place in literature, to- 
gether with some personal reminiscences as to its early 
popularity. It is appended here as a wholly impartial 
estimate of the value of the work by that most competent 
man of letters. — Ed.] 

"In the year 1857 prairie fires were still punctual 
with the falling year on the plains which farms and cities 
now hold against them; and when one said that this 
thing or that was sweeping the country like a prairie fire, 
everyone else knew what one meant, and visualized the 
fact with quick intelligence. But if I say now that in 
1857 a new poem, flashing from a novel impulse in our 
literature, and gay with lights and tints unknown before, 
swept the country like a prairie fire, how many, I wonder, 
will conceive of the astonishing success of 'Nothing to 

284 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Wear.' A misgiving akin to this doubt has haunted me 
throughout the volume in which Mr. William Allen But- 
ler has grouped all he chooses to give the public of his 
verse, and it remains with me still. Whether for good or 
for ill, the pieces are largely expressive of moods that are 
past, in terms which seem dimmer now because they were 
once so brilliantly actual. They have the quality of im- 
provisation, and sometimes achieve their happiest effects 
with the facility which is the half-sister of slight; even 
if one did not know the fact one would easily imagine 
them the amusement of a mind more seriously employed 
with other things; and it scarcely needs Mr. Butler's 
frank acknowledgment to make us feel that but for the 
professional devotion of the able lawyer we might have 
counted in him the cleverest of our society poets. 

"I do not know but we may do this in spite of the able 
lawyer, for when I come to think of it I can recall no poem 
of ours having so much the character of light, graceful, 
amiable satire, with that touch of heart in it which re- 
claims it from mere satire, as * Nothing to Wear.' It is 
quite ours, and it was the first thing of the kind to be 
quite ours. For this reason, as any observer of life will 
understand, it was the more universally appreciable; and 
because it was so true to its own time, perhaps, it is 
destined to continue true to other times. In it the prairie 
fire crossed the Atlantic and relumed its flames in various 
countries of Europe, while it has remained to us a light 
of other days, in which the present time may easily recog- 
nize itself if it cares for self-study. All the civilizations 
are contemporaneous, and the fashionable life of 1857 
which we find mirrored in 'Nothing to Wear' is at least 
no further from us than that which appeals to our sense 
of modernity in the Tangara figurines. But, after all, 
one must have lived in the year 1857, an< ^ been, say, in 
one's twenty-first year, to have felt the full significance 
of its message and shared the joyful surprise of its amaz- 
ing success. If to the enviable conditions suggested one 
joined the advantage of being at that period a newspaper- 
man in a growing city of the Middle West, one had almost 

285 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

unequalled privileges as a spectator and participator of 
the notable event. Upon the whole, I am inclined to 
think that prairie fire suggests a feeble image of the swift 
spread of Mr. Butler's poem under the eye of such a 
witness; and I begin to prefer a train of gunpowder. I 
do not know where the piece first appeared, but I remem- 
ber that with the simple predacity of these days we in- 
stantly lifted the whole of it out of a New York paper, 
hot from the mail, and transferred it to our own columns 
about midnight, as if it were some precious piece of tele- 
graphic intelligence. I am not sure but that it was for us 
something in the nature of a scoop or beat. At any rate, 
no other paper in town had it so early; and I think it 
appeared on our editorial page, and certainly with sub- 
heads supplied by our own eager invention, and with the 
prefatory and concurrent comment which it so little 
needed. 

"We had the proud satisfaction of seeing it copied in 
the evening press with unmistakable evidence, in the sub- 
heads, of having been shamelessly pilfered from our 
columns. We might have made out a very pretty case of 
plagiarism against our esteemed contemporaries, if the 
mail had not brought us from every quarter the proof of 
a taste in poetry as promptly predacious as our own. 
All the newspapers published 'Nothing to Wear,' more 
or less fully, and the common intelligence was enriched 
with a conception, and the common parlance with a 
phrase, destined to remain to at least the present period 
of aftertime. How far they will carry it over into the 
next century is still a question, but in the meantime a 
social situation continues embodied in the poem without 
the rivalry of any other. 

"For the student of our literature 'Nothing to Wear' 
has the interest and value of satire in which our society 
life came to its full consciousness for the first time. To 
be sure there had been the studies of New York called 
'ThePotiphar Papers/ in which Curtis had painted the 
foolish and unlovely face of our fashionable life, but with 
always an eye on other methods and other models; and 

286 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

'Nothing to Wear' came with the authority and the ap- 
peal of something quite indigenous in matter and manner. 
It came winged, and equipped to fly wide and to fly far, 
as only verse can, with a message for the grandchildren 
of 'Flora McFlimsey,' which it delivers to-day in per- 
fectly intelligible terms. 

"It does not indeed find her posterity in Madison 
Square. That quarter has long been delivered over to 
hotels and shops and offices, and the fashion that once 
abode there has fled to upper Fifth Avenue, to the dis- 
cordant variety of handsome residences which overlook 
the Park. But there it finds her descendants quite one 
with her in spirit, and as little clothed to their lasting 
satisfaction. Still they shop in Paris, still they arrive in 
i the steamers with their spoil, still it shrinks and 
withers to nothing in their keeping. Probably there are 
no longer lovers so simple-hearted as to fancy any of 
them going to a function in a street costume, or in a dress 
which has already been worn three times, but, if there 
were, their fate would be as swift and dire. In such 
things the world does not change, and the plutocrats of 
imperial New York spell their qualities with the same 
characters as the plutocrats of imperial Rome. 

"It is this fact which gives me reason to believe that 
Mr. Butler's good-humored satire will find itself as appli- 
cable to conditions at the end of the next century as at 
the end of this; and makes me wish that he had cast more 
of his thought in such lightly enduring form. In several 
other places of his volume an obsolete New York makes 
a pleasant apparition; for instance, a whole order of 
faded things revisits us in the rhyme of 'The Sexton and 
the Thermometer,' but the fable of the old parishioner of 
Grace Church, who finds himself warm enough because 
the sexton has heated the mercury in his glass, is no such 
eternal type as Miss Flora McFlimsey. 

"Some hint of what this poet might have been but for 
his jealous mistress appears here and there in the more 
serious poems; and in one of these at least it breaks into 
a flame of noble humanity. In the verses called 'Rich- 

287 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

mond,' which record a visit to the Virginia capital in the 
old incredible days of slavery, the poet tells how he passes 
suddenly from the presence of such heroic memories of 
liberty as Patrick Henry and Jefferson and Washington, 
and finds himself at a slave auction, among men, women 
and children — 

"'All waiting, waiting to be sold.' 

"The history of the whole moral condition is com- 
pressed in the lines that follow: 

"'Too long my thoughts were schooled to see 

Some pretext jor such fatal thrall; 
Now reason spurns each narrow plea, 

One thrill of manhood cancels all, 
One throb 0} pity sets ME free.' 

"But one must have lived in those days fully to under 
stand these words." 



NOTHING TO WEAR 

Miss Flora M'Flimsey, of Madison Square, 

Has made three separate journeys to Paris, 
And her father assures me, each time she was there, 

That she and her friend Mrs. Harris 
(Not the lady whose name is so famous in history, 
But plain Mrs. H., without romance or mystery) 
Spent six consecutive weeks, without stopping, 
In one continuous round of shopping — 
Shopping alone, and shopping together, 
At all hours of the day, and in all sorts of weather, 
For all manner of things that a woman can put 
On the crown of her head, or the sole of her foot, 
Or wrap round her shoulders, or fit round her waist, 
Or that can be sewed on, or pinned on, or laced, 

288 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Or tied on with a string, or stitched on with a bow, 

In front or behind, above or below; 

For bonnets, mantillas, capes, collars, and shawls; 

Dresses for breakfasts, and dinners, and balls; 

Dresses to sit in, and stand in, and walk in; 

Dresses to dance in, and flirt in, and talk in; 

Dresses in which to do nothing at all; 

Dresses for Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall — 

All of them different in color and shape, 

Silk, muslin, and lace, velvet, satin, and crape, 

Brocade and broadcloth, and other material, 

Quite as expensive and much more ethereal; 

In short, for all things that could ever be thought of, 

Or milliner, modiste, or tradesman be bought of, 

From ten-thousand-franc robes to twenty-sous frills; 
In all quarters of Paris, and to every store, 
While M'FIimsey in vain stormed, scolded, and swore, 

They footed the streets, and he footed the bills! 

The last trip, their goods shipped by the steamer Arago, 
Formed, M'Flimsey declares, the bulk of her cargo, 
Not to mention a quantity kept from the rest, 
Sufficient to fill the largest-sized chest, 
Which did not appear on the ship's manifest, 
But for which the ladies themselves manifested 
Such particular interest, that they invested 
Their own proper persons in layers and rows 
Of muslins, embroideries, worked under-clothes, 
Gloves, handkerchiefs, scarfs, and such trifles as those; 
Then, wrapped in great shawls, like Circassian beauties, 
Gave good-bye to the ship, and go by to the duties. 
Her relations at home all marvelled, no doubt, 
Miss Flora had grown so enormously stout 

For an actual belle and a possible bride; 
But the miracle ceased when she turned inside out, 

And the truth came to light, and the dry-goods beside, 

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WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Which, in spite of Collector and Custom-House sentry, 
Had entered the port without any entry. 

And yet, though scarce three months have passed since the day 
This merchandise went, on twelve carts, up Broadway, 
This same Miss M'Flimsey, of Madison Square, 
The last time we met was in utter despair, 
Because she had nothing whatever to wear! 



x o 



Nothing to wear! Now, as this is a true ditty, 
I do not assert — this, you know, is between us — 

That she's in a state of absolute nudity, 

Like Powers' Greek Slave or the Medici Venus; 

But I do mean to say, I have heard her declare, 
When at the same moment she had on a dress 
Which cost five hundred dollars, and not a cent less, 
And jewelry worth ten times more, I should guess, 

That she had not a thing in the wide world to wear! 



'» 



I should mention just here, that out of Miss Flora's 

Two hundred and fifty or sixty adorers, 

I had just been selected as he who should throw all 

The rest in the shade, by the gracious bestowal 

On myself, after twenty or thirty rejections, 

Of those fossil remains which she called her "affections," 

And that rather decayed, but well-known work of art, 

Which Miss Flora persisted in styling her "heart." 

So we were engaged. Our troth had been plighted, 

Not by moonbeam or starbeam, by fountain or grove, 
But in a front parlor, most brilliantly lighted, 

Beneath the gas-fixtures, we whispered our love. 
Without any romance, or raptures, or sighs, 
Without any tears in Miss Flora's blue eyes, 
Or blushes, or transports, or such silly actions, 
It was one of the quietest business transactions, 
With a very small sprinkling of sentiment, if any, 

290 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

And a very large diamond imported by Tiffany. 

On her virginal lips while I printed a kiss, 

She exclaimed, as a sort of parenthesis, 

And by way of putting me quite at my ease, 

"You know I'm to polka as much as I please, 

And flirt when I like — now, stop, don't you speak — 

And you must not come here more than twice in the week, 

Or talk to me either at party or ball, 

But always be ready to come when I call; 

So don't prose to me about duty and stuff, 

If we don't break this off, there will be time enough 

For that sort of thing; but the bargain must be 

That, as long as I choose, I am perfectly free — 

For this is a kind of engagement, you see, 

Which is binding on you, but not binding on me." 

Well, having thus wooed Miss M'Flimsey and gained her 

With the silks, crinolines, and hoops .that contained her, 

I had, as I thought, a contingent remainder 

At least in the property, and the best right 

To appear as its escort by day and by night; 

And it being the week of the Stuckup's grand ball — 

Their cards had been out a fortnight or so, 

And set all the Avenue on the tiptoe — 
I considered it only my duty to call, 

And see if Miss Flora intended to go. 
I found her — as ladies are apt to be found, 
When the time intervening between the first sound 
Of the bell and the visitor's entry is shorter 
Than usual — I found; I won't say — I caught her, 
Intent on the pier-glass, undoubtedly meaning 
To see if perhaps it didn't need cleaning. 
She turned as I entered — "Why, Harry, you sinner, 
I thought that you went to the Flashers' to dinner!" 
"So I did," I replied, "but the dinner is swallowed, 

And digested, I trust, for 'tis now nine and more, 
So, being relieved from that duty, I followed 

291 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Inclination, which led me, you see, to your door; 
And now will your ladyship so condescend 
As just to inform me if you intend 
Your beauty, and graces, and presence to lend 
(All of which, when I own, I hope no one will borrow) 
To the Stuckup's, whose party, you know, is tomorrow?" 
The fair Flora looked up, with a pitiful air, 
And answered quite promptly, " Why, Harry, mon cher, 
I should like above all things to go with you there, 
But really and truly — I've nothing to wear." 

"Nothing to wear! go just as you are; 
Wear the dress you have on, and you'll be by far, 
I engage, the most bright and particular star 

On the Stuckup horizon — " I stopped, for her eye, 
Notwithstanding this delicate onset of flattery, 
Opened on me at once a most terrible battery 

Of scorn and amazement. She made no reply, 
But gave a slight turn to the end of her nose — 

That pure Grecian feature — as much as to say, 
"How absurd that any sane man should suppose 
That a lady would go to a ball in the clothes, 

No matter how fine, that she wears every day!" 
So I ventured again: "Wear your crimson brocade" — 
(Second turn up of nose) — "That's too dark by a shade." 
"Your blue silk"— "That's too heavy." "Your pink"— "That's 

too light." 
"Wear tulle over satin" — "I can't endure white." 
"Your rose-colored, then, the best of the batch" — 
"I haven't a thread of point-lace to match." 
"Your brown moire antique" — "Yes, and look like a Quaker." 
"The pearl-colored" — "I would, but that plaguy dress-maker 
Has had it a week." "Then that exquisite lilac, 
In which you would melt the heart of a Shylock" — 
(Here the nose took again the same elevation) — 
"I wouldn't wear that for the whole of creation." 
"Why not? It's my fancy, there's nothing could strike it 

292 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

As more comme il faut" — "Yes, but, dear me, that lean 
Sophronia Stuckup has got one just like it, 

And I won't appear dressed like a chit of sixteen." 
"Then that splendid purple, that sweet Mazarine; 
That superb point oV aiguille, that imperial green, 
That zephyr-like tarletan, that rich grenadine" — 
"Not one of all which is fit to be seen," 
Said the lady, becoming excited and flushed. 
"Then wear," I exclaimed, in a tone which quite crushed 

Opposition, "that gorgeous toilette which you sported 
In Paris last spring, at the grand presentation, 
When you quite turned the head of the head of the nation, 

And by all the grand court were so very much courted." 

The end of the nose was portentiously tipped up, 
And both the bright eyes shot forth indignation, 
As she burst upon me with the fierce exclamation, 
"I have worn it three times, at the least calculation, 

And that and most of my dresses are ripped up!" 
Here I ripped out something, perhaps rather rash, 

Quite innocent, though; but, to use an expression 
More striking than classic, it "settled my hash," 

And proved very soon the last act of our session. 
"Fiddlesticks, is it, sir? I wonder the ceiling 
Doesn't fall down and crush you — you men have no feeling; 
You selfish, unnatural, illiberal creatures, 
Who set yourselves up as patterns and preachers, 
Your silly pretence — why, what a mere guess it is! 
Pray, what do you know of a woman's necessities? 
I have told you and shown you I've nothing to wear, 
And it's perfectly plain you not only don't care, 
But you do not believe me" — (here the nose went still higher) 
"I suppose, if you dared, you would call me a liar. 
Our engagement is ended, sir — yes, on the spot; 
You're a brute, and a monster, and — I don't know what." 
I mildly suggested the words Hottentot, 
Pick-pocket, and cannibal, Tartar, and thief, 

293 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

As gentle expletives which might give relief; 
But this only proved as a spark to the powder, 
And the storm I had raised came faster and louder; 
It blew and it rained, thundered, lightened, and hailed 
Interjections, verbs, pronouns, till language quite failed 
To express the abusive, and then its arrears 
Were brought up all at once by a torrent of tears, 
And my last faint, despairing attempt at an obs- 
Ervation was lost in a tempest of sobs. 

Well, I felt for the lady, and felt for my hat, too, 

Improvised on the crown of the latter a tattoo, 

In lieu of expressing the feelings which lay 

Quite too deep for words, as Wordsworth would say; 

Then, without going through the form of a bow, 

Found myself in the entry — I hardly knew how, 

On door-step and sidewalk, past lamp-post and square, 

At home and up-stairs, in my own easy-chair; 

Poked my feet into slippers, my fire into blaze, 
And said to myself, as I lit my cigar, 
"Supposing a man had the wealth of the Czar 

Of the Russias to boot, for the rest of his days, 
On the whole, do you think he would have much to spare, 
If he married a woman with nothing to wear?" 

Since that night, taking pains that it should not be bruited 

Abroad in society, I've instituted 

A course of inquiry, extensive and thorough, 

On this vital subject, and find, to my horror, 

That the fair Flora's case is by no means surprising, 

But that there exists the greatest distress 
In our female community, solely arising 

From this unsupplied destitution of dress, 
Whose unfortunate victims are filling the air 
With the pitiful wail of "Nothing to wear." 
Researches in some of the " Upper Ten' ' districts 

294 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Reveal the most painful and startling statistics, 
Of which let me mention only a few: 
In one single house, on the Fifth Avenue, 
Three young ladies were found, all below twenty-two, 
Who have been three whole weeks without anything new 
In the way of flounced silks, and thus left in the lurch 
Are unable to go to ball, concert, or church. 
In another large mansion, near the same place, 
Was found a deplorable, heart-rending case 
Of entire destitution of Brussels point-lace. 
In a neighboring block there was found, in three calls, 
Total want, long continued, of camel's-hair shawls; 
And a suffering family, whose case exhibits 
The most pressing need of real ermine tippets; 
One deserving young lady almost unable 
To survive for the want of a new Russian sable; 
Still another, whose tortures have been most terrific 
Ever since the sad loss of the steamer Pacific, 
In which were engulfed, not friend or relation 
(For whose fate she perhaps might have found consolation, 
Or borne it, at least, with serene resignation), 
But the choicest assortment of French sleeves and collars 
Ever sent out from Paris, worth thousands of dollars, 
And all as to style most recherche and rare, 
The want of which leaves her with nothing to wear, 
And renders her life so drear and dyspeptic 
That she's quite a recluse, and almost a sceptic, 
For she touchingly says that this sort of grief 
Cannot find in Religion the slightest relief, 
And Philosophy has not a maxim to spare 
For the victims of such overwhelming despair. 
But the saddest, by far, of all these sad features 
Is the cruelty practised upon the poor creatures 
By husbands and fathers, real Bluebeards and Timons, 
Who resist the most touching appeals made for diamonds 
By their wives and their daughters, and leave them for days 

295 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Unsupplied with new jewelry, fans, or bouquets, 

Even laugh at their miseries whenever they have a chance, 

And deride their demands as useless extravagance. 

One case of a bride was brought to my view, 

Too sad for belief, but, alas! 'twas too true, 

Whose husband refused, as savage as Charon, 

To permit her to take more than ten trunks to Sharon. 

The consequence was, that when she got there, 

At the end of three weeks she had nothing to wear, 

And when she proposed to finish the season 

At Newport, the monster refused, out and out, 

For his infamous conduct alleging no reason, 

Except that the waters were good for his gout; 

Such treatment as this was too shocking, of course, 

And proceedings are now going on for divorce. 

But why harrow the feelings by lifting the curtain 
From these scenes of woe ? Enough, it is certain, 
Has here been disclosed to stir up the pity 
Of every benevolent heart in the city, 
And spur up Humanity into a canter 
To rush and relieve these sad cases instanter. 
Won't somebody, moved by this touching description, 
Come forward to-morrow and head a subscription ? 
Won't some kind philanthropist, seeing that aid is 
So needed at once by these indigent ladies, 
Take charge of the matter? Or won't Peter Cooper 
The corner-stone lay of some new splendid super- 
Structure, like that which to-day links his name 
In the Union unending of Honor and Fame, 
And found a new charity just for the care 
Of these unhappy women with nothing to wear, 
Which, in view of the cash which would daily be claimed, 
The Laying-out Hospital well might be named ? 
Won't Stewart, or some of our dry-goods importers, 
Take a contract for clothing our wives and our daughters? 

296 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Or, to furnish the cash to supply these distresses, 
And life's pathway strew with shawls, collars, and dresses, 
For poor womankind, won't some venturesome lover 
A new California somewhere discover? 

O ladies, dear ladies, the next sunny day 
Please trundle your hoops just out of Broadway, 
From its whirl and its bustle, its fashion and pride, 
And the temples of Trade which tower on each side, 
To the alleys and lanes, where Misfortune and Guilt 
Their children have gathered, their city have built; 
Where Hunger and Vice, like twin beasts of prey, 

Have hunted their victims to gloom and despair; 
Raise the rich, dainty dress, and the fine broidered skirt, 
Pick your delicate way through the dampness and dirt, 

Grope through the dark dens, climb the rickety stair 
To the garret, where wretches, the young and the old, 
Half starved and half naked, lie crouched from the cold; 
See those skeleton limbs, those frost-bitten feet, 
All bleeding and bruised by the stones of the street; 
Hear the sharp cry of childhood, the deep groans that swell 

From the poor dying creature who writhes on the floor; 
Hear the curses that sound like the echoes of Hell, 

As you sicken and shudder and fly from the door; 
Then home to your wardrobes, and say, if you dare — 
Spoiled children of fashion — you've nothing to wear! 
And O, if perchance there should be a sphere 
Where all is made right which so puzzles us here, 
Where the glare and the glitter and tinsel of Time 
Fade and die in the light of that region sublime, 
Where the soul, disenchanted of flesh and of sense, 
Unscreened by its trappings and shows and pretence, 
Must be clothed for the life and the service above, 
With purity, truth, faith, meekness, and love, 
O daughters of Earth! foolish virgins, beware! 
Lest in that upper realm you have nothing to wear! 

297 



CHAPTER XIX 

REPUBLICAN PARTY — PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF 1 856 — PRESIDENT BU- 
CHANAN — LECOMPTON CONVENTION — THE ENGLISH BILL — TRIP SOUTH 
WITH CAPTAIN MARSHALL — "AT RICHMOND" — "TWO MILLIONS." 

UNDER the storm and stress of the conflicting voices 
and contending forces aroused by the struggle over 
Kansas, public opinion at the North was more and more 
concentrated upon the absorbing issue of the exclusion 
of slavery from free territory. There was a return by 
men of all parties who opposed interference with slavery 
in the States but favored its exclusion by Congress from 
all the Territories, where it had no legal existence, to the 
simple doctrine first announced by the Free Soil party in 
its Buffalo platform in 1848, "No more slave States and 
no more slave territory." To use a favorite illustration 
of the time, the friends of freedom would draw a belt of 
fire around the slave-holding States, hemming in the 
hated institution and setting a barrier to its incursions 
into free territory. 

Out of this increasing sentiment the political leaders 
at the North, while opposing the Abolitionists, saw that 
the revival of anti-slavery agitation, partially checked 
by the Compromises of 1850, menaced the disintegration 
of both the Whig and Democratic parties. They united in 

298 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

creating the Republican party, which came into existence 
in 1854, and held on June 17, 1856, at Philadelphia its 
first national convention. This convention nominated 
for president John C. Fremont, of California, and for 
vice-president William L. Dayton, of New Jersey. 

Fremont was a candidate of the picturesque and 
romantic type. He had been an early explorer in the 
far West and on the Pacific coast, where his career had 
been one of adventure and peril. He had been active in 
all the steps, civil and military, by which California had 
been brought into the Union, and for a short time had 
been a United States Senator from that State. He had 
well earned the title of " Pathfinder,'' which was used 
with good effect in his campaign for the presidency, 
which was also aided by popular interest in his wife, a 
daughter of Thomas H. Benton, the famous senator from 
Missouri, who had shared the vicissitudes of her hus- 
band's frontier life and was associated in his hardships 
and successes. I met General Fremont at dinner in my 
father's house, No. 31 West Seventeenth Street, in the 
spring of 1856. He impressed me as an interesting and 
attractive man, but not made of quite the stuff which, 
at that period of our national history, seemed requisite for 
a presidential candidate. While his canvass aroused 
much enthusiasm and consolidated the activities of the 
members of the new party by patriotic fervor in bright 
contrast with the old-time conservatism of the Whigs 
and Democrats, the time was not ripe for Republican 
ascendency. 

299 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Before Fremont had been placed in the field by the Re- 
publican party the Democratic convention had nominated 
James Buchanan, of Pennsylvania, and John C. Breck- 
inridge, of Kentucky, as candidates for the presidency and 
vice-presidency. Pierce, notwithstanding his subserviency 
to the slave power, failed of renomination, as did also 
Stephen A. Douglas, who was deemed to have been so 
aggressive in his advocacy of "Popular Sovereignty" as to 
endanger the success of the party in the Northern States. 
Buchanan had been out of the country, representing it 
at the Court of St. James in the plain every-day dress of 
an American gentleman, which the requirements of the 
State Department, as administered by Governor Marcy, 
had substituted for the varieties of court costume pre- 
viously worn by American diplomats in European cap- 
itals. Buchanan's participation in the Ostend scandal 
was not regarded as an obstacle to his election, and his 
long public career and general respectability made him 
an available candidate. 

The lines were squarely drawn between the contend- 
ing parties. The Republicans stood on already defiant 
principles of opposition to any extension of slavery be- 
yond the slave States, and on the paramount duty of 
Congress to legislate to that end, while the Democrats 
denounced interference by Congress to prevent the people 
of the South from entering the Territories with their 
slaves. The Democratic platform adopted "The Balti- 
more Resolves of 1852," and declared "with renewed 
energy of purpose, the well-considered declarations of 

300 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

former conventions upon the sectional issue of domestic 
slavery/' and "the principles contained in the organic 
laws establishing the Territories of Kansas and Ne- 
braska." It claimed for the people of all the Territories 
the right to form a constitution with or without domestic 
slavery and upon terms of perfect equality with the other 
States. Thus were put forward the doctrines of Douglas, 
although he was denied the privilege of being the stand- 
ard-bearer in the fight for their supremacy. 

Democracy triumphed in 1856 as in 1852; but only 
after a bitter contest. Fremont and Dayton, while re- 
ceiving a plurality of the popular vote and carrying New 
York, failed to carry Pennsylvania, Illinois and Indiana. 
Buchanan received 174 electoral votes; Fremont 114, and 
Millard Fillmore, the candidate of the so-called "Ameri- 
can Party," received the 8 votes of Maryland. In New 
York, alternate hopes and fears had prevailed during the 
summer and fall; and it was a great disappointment 
when the result was announced amid the exultations of 
the Democracy. But in the retrospect, it is easy to see 
that the defeat of 1856 was a far surer presage of the vic- 
tory to be gained in i860, than would have been the 
success that was so earnestly coveted and sought for. 
A united North was needed to cope with the "Solid 
South"; and another four years of slavery aggression 
were needed to show the full extent of slavery's disloyalty 
to the Union. 

Buchanan was the last of the pro-slavery presidents. 
In one of his latest messages, on the eve of his retire- 

301 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

ment from office, he described himself in a somewhat 
pathetic phrase as "an old public functionary." And this 
in fact he was, a man of routine, careful of precedents, 
wedded to the doctrines which he had professed during 
his whole political life, and cherishing a horror of men 
given to change, within or without his party, and espe- 
cially of those who sought to check the course of slavery 
and the slave power. His subserviency to the South was 
complete. With new zeal, but on a different footing 
from the policy of his predecessor, he took up the lingering 
and long-drawn-out contest against the people of Kansas 
in their struggle with border ruffianism. 

When Congress met in December 1857, the country 
was surprised to find that Douglas, the author, exponent 
and champion of "Popular Sovereignty," was an avowed 
opponent of the President and the administration. Kan- 
sas had been enjoying a temporary period of quiet under 
the administration of Governor Geary, a man of ability 
and fairness, disposed to deal justly with the people and 
to secure their rights. But he was soon displaced; and 
the pro-slavery conspirators at Washington busied them- 
selves in forging a new link in the chain by which they 
hoped to bind "Bleeding Kansas" still more firmly in 
captivity to their will. 

The new device was carried out by calling a constitu- 
tional convention to meet at Lecompton in October, 1857. 
The delegates representing pro-slavery partisans, largely 
elected by fraudulent votes, adopted a constitution so 
framed as to require a submission to popular vote only in 

302 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

such a way as to insure the continued existence and pro- 
tection to slavery. The free settlers abstained from vot- 
ing either for delegates to the convention or for the pro- 
posed constitution; and the result of their absence from 
the polls was that the Lecompton Constitution received 
the affirmative vote only of the pro-slavery settlers and 
their fraudulent abettors. Nevertheless it was accepted 
by President Buchanan; and he determined to repre- 
sent to Congress that it expressed the will of the people 
of the Territory. This extraordinary course of action, at 
variance with the rights of the people of the territory, 
gave Douglas an opportunity for defiant and effective op- 
position. He saw clearly that if the administration policy 
prevailed, his leadership was lost; and by something 
like a coup de theatre he hurled defiance against the 
Lecompton policy. 

After the reading of the President's message, Douglas 
made the bold declaration, "I totally dissent from that 
portion of the Message which may fairly be construed as 
approving the proceedings of the Lecompton Conven- 
tion." ' This was an open declaration of war, on his 
part, against Buchanan and his extreme coadjutors. It 
excited wide-spread interest and no little admiration in 
the North because, though it was well-known that the 
action of Douglas was not inspired by any preference for 
freedom, as he had said in the Senate that he did not care 
whether slavery was " voted down or voted «/>," it made 
him the open opponent of the ultra pro-slavery portion 

1 William G. Sumner, "Andrew Jackson," p. 167. 

303 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

of his own party. He had most adroitly, at the opening 
of Congress, turned the attention of the public from 
Buchanan, his successful rival for the presidency, and 
centered it on himself in his supreme effort to retain his 
prestige, and leadership. Later, in the spring of 1857, 
he came to the City of New York. I met him at a recep- 
tion given by Mr. and Mrs. Bancroft. He had just mar- 
ried the foremost belle of Washington society, who, as 
our hostess said to me, had been a queen before she was 
a senator's wife. 1 She accompanied her husband on his 
Eastern tour, and was certainly a woman of remarkable 
beauty and intelligence. Douglas himself, while not pre- 
possessing in appearance, being of diminutive stature 
with a disproportionately large head, was, of course, a 
most interesting and impressive figure; and, owing to 
his stand against the controlling element of his own party, 
was hailed with something of the applause accorded a 
hero. 

The defection of Douglas and his fight against the 
Lecompton Constitution was the entering wedge which 
made sure the disruption of the Democratic party. The 
old classical saying, "Whom the gods wish to destroy they 
first make mad," was abundantly illustrated in the des- 
perate course of Buchanan, Jefferson Davis and their 
Southern allies in the despotic policy by which they sought 
to establish the extreme doctrine for which Calhoun had 

1 Stephen A. Douglas was twice married. This reference is doubtless to his 
second wife, who was Miss Adele Cutts, daughter of James Madison Cutts, a 
leader of Washington society. 

304 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

contended, namely, that Congress had no power to ex- 
clude slavery from any part of the territory of the United 
States, the whole domain being under the constitution 
open to slave-holders, with the right to carry slavery into 
it as a permanent institution. The ensuing debate in 
Congress, punctuated by threats of disunion, secession 
and armed resistance on the part of the South, and by a 
flood of petitions, remonstrances and patriotic speeches 
in both Houses, marked the progress of the conflict over 
Kansas. 

After repeated contests in the Territory and violent 
contentions in Congress, the genius of " Compromise " 
was, once more and for the last time, made to subserve a 
piece of legislation by Congress more insulting to the 
people in Kansas than anything previously attempted. 
This was a project brought forward to end the deadlock 
in a conference committee of tne two Houses of Con- 
gress in the spring of 1858. It was called "The English 
Bill," from William H. English, of Indiana, who pro- 
posed it. The project was to couple the submission of 
the Lecompton Constitution to the vote of the people of 
the Territory with an offer of a grant of public lands in 
aid of the State, in case of the adoption of the constitu- 
tion; but should the constitution be rejected, the admis- 
sion of Kansas, as a State, was to be postponed until the 
population should equal the ratio required for a repre- 
sentative. 

The proffer of this bribe was expected by its promot- 
ers to secure the adoption of the obnoxious constitution 

305 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

with its provision protecting and perpetuating slavery. 
Douglas voted against it, but it passed both Houses, was 
signed by the President and became a law. But in spite 
of all the adverse and malign influences at Washington, 
freedom, during the long contest protracted through a 
period of some five years, had been steadily gaining in 
Kansas; and when the vote came to be taken under the 
"English Bill" in August 1858, out of 13,088 votes cast, 
11,300 were against the acceptance of the bribe and the 
Lecompton Constitution. As the historian Rhodes says, 
in closing the narrative of the Kansas-Nebraska conflict: 
"This disposed of the Lecompton Constitution, and 
effectively determined that slavery should not exist in 
Kansas. But the question left an irreconcilable breach 
in the Democratic party which was big with consequences 
for the Republicans and for the country." ' 

In the spring of this year I made a trip to Richmond in 
company with my father-in-law, Captain Marshall, and 
there had my last sight of slavery and the slave trade. 
My poem, "At Richmond," is a faithful narrative of my 
experiences in the city which was soon to become the 
Capital of the Southern Confederacy. From the hill 
overlooking the town, crowned by the then recently 
erected monument to Washington, Thomas Crawford's 
last and most important work, I came down into the old 
city and to a building which flaunted the red flag of an 
auction sale of slaves. The description of the crowd out- 
side the door and within the building is true to the life 

1 Rhodes, " Hist, of the United States," vol. II, p. 301. 

306 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

as it shocked my sight and sensibilities and the invoca- 
tion in the closing verse gave expression to the thought 
inspired by this exhibition of the crime and cruelty of 
slavery. 

This poem, published in The Independent on my 
return home, elicited the warm commendation of John 
G. Whittier, in a letter which showed that he was glad to 
welcome me as a co-worker with himself in the cause of 
human freedom. 

AT RICHMOND 

At Richmond, in the month of May, 

I climbed the city's lofty crest; 
Below, the level landscape lay, 

And proudly streamed, from east to west, 
The glories of the dawning day. 

There stand the statues Crawford gave 
His country, while with bleeding heart 

She showered upon his open grave 
The laurels of victorious Art, 

And wept the life she could not save. 

How grandly, on that granite base, 

The youthful hero sits sublime; 
The leader of the chosen race, 

The noblest of the sons of Time, 
With all his future in his face. 

And he who framed the matchless plan 

For freedom and his fatherland, 
Type of the just, sagacious Man, 

Like Aristides, calm and grand, 
Within the Roman Vatican. 

3°7 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Nor less he wears the patriot wreath, 
The foremost of the three, who stands 

As when with his prophetic breath, 

And flashing eyes, and out-stretched hands, 

He cried for "Liberty or Death!" 

Here surely it is good to be, 

Where Freedom's native soil I tread, 

And, on the mount, transfigured see 
The Fathers, with whose fame we wed 

The endless blessings of the free. 

But when the summit's ample crown 
Flamed with the morning's fiercer heat, 

I turned, and slowly passing down, 

With curious gaze, from street to street, 

Went wandering through the busy town. 

And lingered, where I chanced to hear 
The voices of a crowd, that hung, 

With laugh and oath and empty jeer, 
Beside a door o'er which was swung 

The red flag of the auctioneer. 

In truth, it was a motley crew: 
The brutal trader, sly and keen; 

The planter, with his sunburn hue; 
The idle townsman, and between, 

With face unwashed, the foreign Jew. 

Within, O God of grace! what sight 

Was this for eyes which scarce had turned 

From yonder monumental height, 

For thoughts upon whose altars burned 

The fires just kindled in its light! 
308 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

So when the rapt disciples came 
From Tabor on that blessed morn, 

What chilled so soon their hearts of flame ? 
The fierce demoniac, wild and torn, 

The cry of human guilt and shame. 

For here were men, young men and old, 

Scarred with hot iron and the lash; 
And women, crushed with griefs untold; 

And little children, cheap for cash- 
All waiting, waiting— to be sold! 

For me, each hourly good I crave 
Comes at the bidding of my will; 

For them, the shadows of the grave 
Have gathered, or the woes that fill 

The life-long bondage of the slave. 

Too long my thoughts were schooled to see 
Some pretext for such fatal thrall; 

Now reason spurns each narrow plea, 
One thrill of manhood cancels all, 

One throb of pity sets me free. 

Virginia! shall the great and just, 
Like sentries, guard the slaver's den ? 

O, rise, and from your borders thrust 
This thrice-accursed trade in men, 

Or hurl your heroes to the dust! 

On the evening of July 28, 1858, on invitation of 
the Phi Beta Kappa Society of Yale College, I delivered, 
in the Central Church of New Haven, before one of the 
most brilliant and cultivated audiences I have ever ad- 

309 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

dressed, my poem of "Two Millions." Judge Joseph 
Story, of the United States Supreme Court, had accepted 
an invitation to deliver an address on the same evening, 
but some time before the date of the anniversary of the 
society he cancelled his engagement, and the committee 
in charge offered me the whole evening. I availed of this 
offer and my poem occupied the entire time devoted to 
the occasion. During its delivery I had a strange, and 
to me an amusing, experience. I suddenly lost the hear- 
ing of my own voice and, finding that I did not regain it, 
paused to inquire of a gentleman near me on the plat- 
form whether there was any perceptible change in it, and 
on being assured by him that there was not, I went on, 
without reference to my own inability to hear what I was 
reciting to the audience. The poem was well received, 
and as the Appletons had printed it in book-form and 
published it in New Haven and New York the day after 
its delivery, it immediately attained a large sale and was 
decidedly successful. I included "Two Millions" in the 
volume of my poems published by James R. Osgood 
& Co., in 1871, but omitted it from the edition of 1900 
on account of its length, which would have swelled the 
volume unduly. The story which it told was that of a 
miserly millionaire who was found one morning appar- 
ently lifeless, with his will in his hands, rent in twain 
either by his violent act or by the convulsive spasms fol- 
lowing the stroke which rendered him unconscious. 
This raised a question over which his next of kin engaged 
in a fierce conflict, which was suddenly terminated by 

310 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

the unexpected restoration of the supposed decedent and 
his rescue, by his formerly neglected adopted daughter, 
from his selfish and sordid life. No one in particular sat 
for the portrait of "Firkin," the chief figure in the poem. 
The Evening Post of July 30, 1858, was quite correct in 
its conclusion on this subject, as stated in the following 
paragraph: 

"Everyone is inquiring who old Firkin is, in Mr. But- 
ler's poem of 'Two Millions,' and several have suggested 
the name of a deceased millionaire, whose will has been 
and still is the subject of a somewhat notorious and 
painful litigation. This conjecture rests, we presume, 
mainly, if not entirely, upon the catastrophe of the story, 
for Firkin is evidently a type, not an individual. Like 
Gradgrind, he embodies the weaknesses and the hard- 
nesses of a class, all of which were never seen in any one 
person. It is idle, therefore, to endeavor to aim this 
satire at any person or family. It was prepared, we 
doubt not, with a wider and nobler purpose than could 
be answered by painting the portrait of any single in- 
dividual." 

[My father's exquisite tribute to woman at the close 
of the poem is quoted here. — Ed.] 



"Nor waits alone. Such have there ever been, 
Since human grief has followed human sin, 
The patient, perfect women! As they climb, 
With bleeding feet, the flinty crags of time, 
Not for the praise of man, or earth's renown, 
They bear the cross and wear the martyr's crown. 

311 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Though queenly medal, stamped with royal heads, 

Their humble toil to endless honor weds; 

Though, like a bow of hope, their fame is bent, 

From side to side of each broad continent; 

And pictured volume, with its tinted page, 

Bears their meek features to the coming age; 

A higher joy their gentle spirits reap, 

Where, all unknown, their silent watch they keep, 

Far from the echo of the world's applause, 

Through sultry noon, or midnight's dreary pause, 

By sorrow's waking groan or fitful sleep, 

Where helpless infants gasp their parting breath, 

Cradled in suffering and baptized with death; 

Or strong men, tossing, with delirious lips, 

In fever-tempests and the mind's eclipse, 

Plunge through the starless storm, like foundering ships; 

Or old age, shrinking from the tyrant's clutch, 

Feels, through the darkness, for their tender touch. 

Watching and waiting, till the rising morn 

Shall greet their saintly faces, pale and worn 

With the long vigil, as they steal away, 

Through darkened chambers, at the dawn of day, 

Unloose the casement to the early air, 

Hail its pure radiance with their purer prayer; 

Drink in fresh courage with its quickening breath; 

Then shut the sunlight from the bed of death, 

But bear, serenely, to the sufferer's side 

A brighter beauty than the morning-tide, 

No eye beholding save their risen Lord's, 

Who sees in secret but in sight rewards! 

Their fairest earthly crown, the wreath that twines, 

Not round loud platforms, or proud senate domes, 

But those pure altars, those perpetual shrines, 

Which grace and gladden all our Saxon Homes! " 



312 



CHAPTER XX 

BENJAMIN F. BUTLER — HIS LAST LEGAL CASES — TRIP TO EUROPE — 
HIS ILLNESS — DEATH AND FUNERAL — RESOLUTIONS — WILLIAM CURTIS 

NOYES — EVERT A. DUYCKINCK — SAMUEL TILDEN — HIS WILL 

ASTOR-LENOX-TILDEN FOUNDATION. 

THE chief and saddest event of 1858 in our family 
circle was the death of my father. He died on 
the 8th of November, at the Hotel du Louvre, at Paris, 
aged 62 years, 10 months and 15 days. The death of my 
mother was a great blow from which my father never fully 
rallied. He withdrew from the general practice of his 
profession to devote himself almost exclusively to a group 
of cases constituting a most important, and, in some re- 
spects, unprecedented litigation. These were known as 
"The North American Trust and Banking Company " 
cases. That company, a New York corporation, bor- 
rowed $1,500,000 of Palmer, McKellop, Dent & Co., and 
of other English creditors, and issued its bonds and other 
securities for the debt. The company failed and went 
into the hands of a receiver, a very able and shrewd Wall 
Street financier, who, with the aid of an equally able and 
shrewd lawyer, formed a scheme in the interest of the 
stockholders of the bankrupt company to defeat the 
claims of the English creditors and destroy their debts. 

3 l 3 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

All sorts of technical defenses were raised, such as 
usury, want of power in the corporation to make the 
bonds, and other informalities and violations of law. The 
effect of these defenses, if successful, would have been 
to free the assets of the company in the hands of the 
receiver from any liability to the English creditors and 
leave them for distribution among the stockholders, whose 
stock was worthless unless this repudiation could be ac- 
complished. Mr. J. Horsley Palmer, was, at that time, a 
leading official of the Bank of England, which was in- 
terested in the claims. If I recollect right a Mr. Fresh- 
field was solicitor for the bank of Palmer, McKellop, 
Dent & Co. Mr. Roundell Palmer, afterward Lord 
Selborne, was the principal counsel. A shrewd Scotch- 
man named MacFarlan was sent to New York by the 
English creditors as a watch-dog over their interests, to 
which he was persistently devoted. 

The plan of the conspirators to defeat the debt em- 
braced the bringing of suits on comparatively small claims 
against the bankrupt company on obligations similar to 
those held by the English creditors, or nearly so, and 
getting decisions declaring them void. Another part of 
the plan was the retaining, as counsel, of judges as they 
retired from the bench, and the creating of a legal and 
judicial atmosphere fatal to the claims of the English 
creditors. My father had to bear the brunt of the fight, 
although Charles King, William Kent, Charles O'Conor, 
William Curtis Noyes, and others were associated with 
him. When the cases reached the Court of Appeals the 

3H 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Court gave the entire term to the hearing of the argu- 
ments. This was justified on the ground that ordinarily 
in a term they heard about one hundred cases involving on 
an average $10,000 each. As these cases involved $1,500,- 
000 and also very important questions, and as there was 
a wonderful array of talent on both sides, a month was 
not thought too much time for the hearing. 1 The Eng- 
lish creditors succeeded at all points; the former decisions 
on which the receiver's counsel relied were held not to ap- 
ply; and the attempt to repudiate the debts wholly failed. 
Since that time, now over forty years ago, we have become 
so accustomed to large figures and cases involving many 
millions that the North American Trust and Banking 
Company litigation seems almost insignificant in amount; 
but at that time it was of the utmost consequence and of 
vital importance to the English creditors. 

In 1856 my father had made a short visit to England 
in company with my old friend and companion in travel, 
George L. Duyckinck, and had greatly enjoyed the hos- 
pitality extended to him by Lord Brougham, for whom 
he had a high admiration. My father kept up his interest 
in public affairs, and never abated his zeal in advocating 
the principles of the Free Soil party, of which he had been 
one of the most conspicuous founders. In common with 
all those who had united in its formation, but who had 
supported Pierce in 1852, in the mistaken confidence that 
the "Compromise Measures" of 1850 had healed the 

1 The report of these cases is in Volume XV, New York Reports, where 
it occupies nearly 300 pages. 

315 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

wounds which slavery agitation had caused, he greatly 
deplored the defection of the President and his breach of 
plighted faith to the country. He joined heartily with 
liberty-loving men of all parties in denouncing the Kan- 
sas-Nebraska bill for the outrages which it promoted, 
joined the Republican party upon its formation, and ad- 
vocated the election of Fremont and Dayton. 

I think his last public appearance was at a meeting of 
citizens held in City Hall Park, May 13, 1854, to denounce 
the crime against Kansas. At this meeting he startled 
some of his old associates by declaring, as the most con- 
vincing proof of his hostility to the attempted introduc- 
tion of slavery into free territory, that if he were called 
upon to choose between Douglas and Seward, as rival 
nominees for the presidency, he would cast his vote for 
Seward. Many of the Democrats who had been Free 
Soilers in 1848 had returned to the party fold in 1852 and 
voted for Buchanan, but my father cut loose from them 
and severed himself once for all from the party with 
which he had been so long identified and to which he had 
given such faithful service. He did not live to see the 
triumph of Republican principles or the catastrophe and 
results of the Rebellion. Perhaps, in the language of 
Holy Writ, he was mercifully "taken away from the evil 
to come." 

One important case which engaged and for a time 
engrossed my father's professional energies, he under- 
took largely out of regard to the memory of my uncle 
William Howard Allen, and in behalf of one of my 

316 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

uncle's companions in arms — Captain Uriah P. Levy. 
Levy was an able and gallant officer, but he was under 
the ban which race prejudice, then strongly prevalent 
in the navy, made an effective obstacle to an equality 
in social standing with his fellow-officers. Wherever he 
served he became the object of petty spite, malicious ac- 
cusations and persistent ostracism. Complaints were 
made against him, he was court-martialed and tried, time 
after time, and almost invariably convicted, suspended 
from duty, and otherwise made to bear penalties meted 
out with a severe hand for comparatively trivial offenses. 
Finally he was dismissed from the navy. 

Levy believing himself to be the victim of a great 
wrong, brought his case to my father and besought his 
aid. The cause was a desperate one, and the client was 
a man who had been unable to escape from complaints 
which, perhaps, although originating in prejudice, had 
made him generally unpopular. My father, after full in- 
vestigation of the facts and the law, made up his mind that 
Levy had been unjustly dealt with, and was entitled to be 
reinstated in the navy and compensated for the illegal 
and cruel treatment he had received. Accordingly he 
advised an application for a court of inquiry, which he 
succeeded in obtaining, and, after a long trial in which 
Levy's whole career and the catalogue of the supposed 
crimes he had committed were made the subject of pa- 
tient and thorough investigation, he was triumphantly 
vindicated. On the basis of the findings of the court, 
and after an exhaustive argument in his favor by my 

317 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

father, an Act of Congress was passed restoring Captain 
Levy to his rank in the navy, with an award of back pay 
for all the years of his disgrace. This was one of the 
most notable achievements, as it was the last, of my fa- 
ther's professional career, and finely illustrated his gen- 
erous impulses and his strong sense of justice. 

In the summer of 1858 my father made his plans for 
an extended tour in Europe with my then two unmarried 
sisters, Eliza 1 and Lydia, 2 and sailed from New York 
October 16, on the steamer Arago, Captain Lyons. My last 
sight of him was as he stood in the stern of the vessel 
waving his adieus. The thought that I might never see 
him again in this world hardly occurred to me, as I sup- 
posed him to be going in quest of recreation and rest under 
the most favorable conditions. A letter dated at Rouen, 
November 1st, written in good spirits, was the last I ever 
received from him. Besides my sisters he had, in this 
last illness in a strange land, the companionship of two 
most faithful friends, Mr. and Mrs. Frederick Brown of 
Philadelphia, who were fellow-voyagers with him on the 
Arago and were alarmed at his condition before he reached 
Paris. He had been suffering for a long time from a 
fatal malady, the nature of which was not then under- 
stood by the medical faculty as it is now, when the 
name of "Bright's Disease" has unhappily become too 
familiar to us. My father's last hours were painless and 
serene. Although fully conscious that he was to die far 
away from home and in a foreign land, his soul was not 

1 Mrs. Thomas S. Kirkbride. 2 Mrs. Alfred Booth. 

318 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

disquieted within him, and he accepted the inevitable 
with composure and a cheerful Christian acquiesence. 

The steamer Arago, on which my father sailed from 
home, brought back his mortal remains. Before she left, 
a meeting of Americans in Paris was held November 12, 
1858, at the banking house of John Monroe & Co., to 
pay a tribute to his memory. John Y. Mason, of Virginia, 
then American minister to France, presided and ex-Gov- 
ernor Hamilton Fish, of New York, offered resolutions 
commemorative of my father's public services and pri- 
vate character and of affectionate sympathy with his 
family. A copy of these was sent to me by Mr. Mason, 
enclosed in a letter expressing his personal feelings. 

Shortly after the arrival of the Arago the funeral ser- 
vices were held in the Mercer Street Church, December 2, 
1858. A large audience gathered to pay the last tribute 
of respect to his memory. Addresses were made by Rev. 
Dr. Thomas Skinner, Rev. Dr. William B. Sprague, Rev. 
Dr. William Adams, and Rev. Dr. George W. Bethune. 
The day before the funeral a meeting of the bar of New 
York had been held in the United States District Court- 
room, which was very largely attended by members of 
the bench and bar as well as by many persons outside of 
the profession. Judge Samuel Nelson, of the Supreme 
Court of the United States, presided, and addresses were 
made by Samuel J. Tilden, William Kent, Marshall S. 
Bidwell, John W. Edmonds and Daniel Lord. The reso- 
lutions passed at this meeting, which I understand were 
drawn by Samuel J. Tilden, were not cast in the con- 

319 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

ventional mould, too often in use on such occasions, but 
were especially noteworthy in bringing into prominence 
the trait of unselfish and generous treatment by my 
father of the younger members of the profession associ- 
ated with him. The main resolutions were as follows: 

"Resolved, that in the death of Benjamin F. Butler 
the legal profession and the public at large are called to 
mourn the loss of a Jurist, who was illustrious by his 
abilities and learning and by an active career, as Advo- 
cate and counsel of more than forty years duration, em- 
bracing eminent services as Attorney-General of the 
United States and in many other important civil trusts; 
and who in the results of his labors, jointly with John 
C. Spencer and John Duer, in the revision and codifica- 
tion of the Statutory Laws of the State of New York, 
has left an imperishable monument of his attainments 
as a lawyer and his capacities as a legislator. 

" Resolved, that while we thus express our sense of the 
abilities and achievements, as a jurist, of our departed 
brother, a just appreciation of his character and services 
prompts us to a special commemoration of the scrupulous 
care with which he ever sought to guard and promote the 
dignity and usefulness of our profession, and to make it 
the means of purifying and strengthening the adminis- 
tration of Justice; his devotion to it as a liberal and scien- 
tific pursuit; his efforts to improve the legislation and 
jurisprudence of this State; the equity and affectionate 
courtesy which pervaded his intercourse with his brethren 
during the long period of his active practice at the Bar; 
the generous freedom with which he ever opened to an 
associate the use of his ample stores of learning and 
thought, which he had laboriously prepared, even though 
that associate was to precede him in the argument; his 
taste for liberal studies cultivated amid the severest pres- 
sure of business; and, above all, his Christian virtues, 

320 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

whose charities, without losing their energy, embraced all 
religious denominations and all classes of men, whose 
graces adorned his daily life, and cast a beautiful lustre 
over its closing hours." 

All the addresses made at Paris and New York are 
collected in the memorial printed for the family of my 
father by D. Appleton & Co. In my own copy of this 
memorial I have inserted some of the original letters and 
papers, and proceedings of various bodies, relating to his 
death. 

The men I have referred to as associated with my 
father in the North American Trust Company cases were 
all eminent in the profession. 

Mr. William Curtis Noyes was one of the ablest and 
most esteemed members of our Metropolitan Bar. He 
came from Oneida County to New York, thoroughly 
equipped for professional service of the highest grade and 
was soon in the front rank of the profession and always on 
the fighting line for the full enforcement of legal rights. 
This was his favorite method of action. A severe malady 
which attacked his eyes impaired his pursuit of pro- 
fessional studies and activities, but he resolutely perse- 
vered until restored eyesight came with splendid oppor- 
tunities for the exercise of his rare ability. Mr. Noyes 
lived on the northeast corner of Fifth Avenue and Thir- 
tieth Street. In the rear of his house he erected a build- 
ing exclusively for his library, which occupied the whole 
interior of the structure above the basement. It was a 

321 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

large and lofty room, two stories in height, the galleries 
on the upper part being reached by a central spiral stair- 
case as well as from the second story of the main house. 
He was much sought after as an advising counsel in the 
most important litigations of the day and was capable of 
accomplishing an extraordinary amount of professional 
work. I can recall no lawyer who was more thoroughly 
serviceable to the profession and to the courts. He con- 
fined himself exclusively to his profession, was always 
alert and untiring in the interests of his client, and was 
universally esteemed for his high personal character. 
But like so many of our profession he went on respond- 
ing to every call and undertaking, every new task, until 
his overtaxed energies gave way on a sudden, and he 
died when in his sixtieth year. His house passed into 
other hands, but his noble law library is preserved at 
Hamilton College, to which be bequeathed it by his will. 
New York has long been rich in private libraries as well 
as in collections of works of art, but I have seen many of 
these brought under the auctioneer's hammer, their con- 
tents dispersed and no memorial left of the labor and 
care expended in their creation. In more recent years, 
I think there has been a growing disposition on the part 
of collectors to place their collections in public institu- 
tions devoted to literature or art. Among the valuable 
private libraries of the city was that of the brothers Duyck- 
inck, Evert A. and George L. It was particularly rich 
in English drama. The house where they lived, No. 20 
Clinton Place, was full of books from the basement up- 

322 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

ward, and created the genial atmosphere in which they 
pursued their literary studies and labors and entertained 
their circle of friends. 

Before my marriage, and while the Duyckincks were 
publishing and editing The Literary World, to which I 
was a constant contributor, I spent many a pleasant hour 
in their quiet and delightful home. In the memorial 
sketch of the elder Duyckinck which I read before the 
New York Historical Society, January 7, 1879, anc ^ m tne 
brief memoir of the younger brother, prepared by me at 
the request of the New England Historical and Genealog- 
ical Society and published in the volume issued by it, I 
endeavored to do justice to the high character, love of 
letters and literary abilities of both these fraternal co- 
laborers. The younger brother, who never married, 
died March 30, 1863. Evert, the elder of the two, had 
the misfortune to lose his children, and at his death, 
August 13, 1878, was survived only by his wife. By his 
will he gave the library, of which he was at the time of his 
death the sole possessor, to the Lenox Library, and Mrs. 
Duyckinck, following out her husband's wishes, gave his 
entire estate to the same institution, subject to the pay- 
ment of the income to certain beneficiaries during life. 
George H. Moore, who was the librarian of the Lenox 
Library and with myself one of the executors of Mrs. 
Duyckinck's will, is my authority for saying that this is 
the only instance in the annals of literature of a man of 
letters giving his whole fortune to a public literary insti- 
tution. The estate, as it will finally come into the posses- 

323 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

sion of the New York Public Library, Astor, Tilden, and 
Lenox Foundations, will represent, exclusive of the books 
already in their ownership, a value of over $150,000. 

This reference to the New York Library leads me to 
mention the remarkable results already attained by the 
consolidation of the Astor and Lenox Foundations with 
that of Governor Tilden, who, by his will, made a munifi- 
cent provision for a free public library in the City of 
New York. Although his intention was, to a large de- 
gree, frustrated by the decision of the Court of Appeals 
invalidating the bequest, a large part of it was secured 
by the trustees as the result of a compromise with one 
of the principal heirs, and this sum, amounting to about 
$2,000,000, together with his valuable collection of books, 
became the property of the Public Library. 

It has often been asked why Samuel J. Tilden, who 
was himself an eminent lawyer, should have left a will 
which, as to its main purposes, was adjudged by the 
court of last resort to be invalid and void. This very 
natural query I am able to answer from the information 
given me by one of his closest friends, an executor named 
in the will. Governor Tilden, though learned and skilled 
in the law of contracts and corporations, had no special 
experience or practice in reference to the law of wills and 
the statutes and decisions of the Court of Appeals as to 
testamentary dispositions of property. He drew his will 
and submitted it to the scrutiny of the friend to whom I 
have referred, who, although a lawyer by profession, had 
been for many years retired from active practice, and who 

324 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

advised him that in a matter of so great importance he 
ought to have the aid of the best legal talent he could 
procure. Whereupon Governor Tilden said that when 
Mr. O'Conor came to town from Nantucket, where he 
had taken up his permanent abode, he would ask his 
opinion. Mr. O'Conor came to New York, and the will 
was placed in his hands. He expressed a wish to examine 
the latest authorities bearing on the subject, but, without 
apparently having been able to do so, left the city and re- 
turned the will to Governor Tilden, advising that he con- 
sult a lawyer of the highest repute whom he named. 
This suggestion Governor Tilden accepted and the will 
went into the hands of the counsel designated by Mr. 
O'Conor. He, in turn, sent it back to its author with a 
statement that it required revision, and proposing a con- 
sultation with Governor Tilden for that purpose. 

It was a habit of Governor Tilden, well known to his 
friends and to his professional and political associates, to 
put off matters on which he was not absolutely compelled 
to act with promptness. The conference called for by 
the counsel whom he had consulted was postponed until, 
as so often happens, death came, and it was impossible. 
The will as it had been drawn and executed was never 
altered so as to make it effectual as intended by the testa- 
tor. Happily that which was saved out of Governor 
Tilden's estate perpetuates his name with those of Astor 
and Lenox as a public benefactor, and the remarkable 
unanimity with which both the legislature and the city 
authorities have provided the means of creating a great 

325 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

public library is one of the most marked and memorable 
instances of public spirit and wise beneficence in our 
annals. 

As one of the trustees of the Lenox Library and later 
of the New York Public Library, I have been greatly in- 
terested in the successive steps by which every obstacle 
has been cleared away, first in the task of consolidation 
and then in the procurement of State and municipal co- 
operation. Only those acquainted with the details of the 
work and with the care and skill of those concerned in 
promoting it and in securing the beneficial result which 
has been accomplished, can form any idea of the value of 
their patient and persevering efforts. 



326 



CHAPTER XXI 

DRED SCOTT CASE — DOUGLAS AND LINCOLN RIVAL CANDIDATES FOR SENA- 
TOR — JOHN BROWN'S RAID — LINCOLN IN NEW YORK — COOPER UNION 
SPEECH — VISIT TO FIVE POINTS SCHOOL OF INDUSTRY — NOMINATIONS 
AT CHICAGO CONVENTION — GOVERNOR SEWARD — PRESIDENTIAL CAM- 
PAIGN OF i860. 

IN the winter and spring of 1859, tne administration of 
President Buchanan was dragging its slow length 
along, chiefly noteworthy by its abject submission to the 
dictates of the slave power in the continued contest over 
Kansas. The hands of the Southern oligarchy had been 
greatly strengthened by a decision of the Supreme Court 
of the United States in what has passed into history as 
the "Dred Scott Case." 

Dred Scott, originally a slave, had been taken with 
his family by his master from the South into one of the 
free States of the West, and, taking advantage of the 
laws of that State, claimed that, having become free by its 
laws, he could not be returned in slavery to the State of 
Missouri where he was afterwards taken. He brought 
suit to establish the rights of himself and family as free 
citizens. He had one decision in his favor; but this was 
reversed on appeal, and his case was then carried by 
writ of error to the Supreme Court of the United States 
at Washington. The main question was whether Dred 

327 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Scott was in any sense a citizen, so as to have the right 
to come into court and maintain his cause. It would 
have been easy for the majority of the court to have dis- 
missed his appeal for want of jurisdiction on the ground 
of his non-citizenship, but Chief Justice Taney, a South- 
ern Democrat, holding extreme views in favor of slavery, 
in an evil hour for his own repute, thought it a favorable 
opportunity to construe the Constitution and give effect 
to its provisions in such manner as to uphold the most 
aggressive views of the slave-holders. 

His opinion went minutely into the history of African 
slavery as it existed in this country and as it had been 
maintained by law. While he denied the rights claimed 
by Dred Scott in particular, in his denial he embraced 
every member of that unfortunate race, by his declaration 
that in the opinion "which prevailed in civilized and en- 
lightened portions of the world at the time of the Declara- 
tion of Independence" and "for more than a century 
before," the members of this race "had no rights which 
the white man was bound to respect." 1 This last oft- 
quoted phrase is about all that remains in the minds of 
men of the "Dred Scott Case," but the whole of Justice 
Taney's opinion was hailed by the South as incontrovert- 
ibly upholding all that they claimed in respect to their 
right to take their slave property wherever they chose into 
the new Territories. Other judges of the court wrote 
opinions denying the right claimed by Dred Scott. Judge 
Benjamin R. Curtis, of Massachusetts, one of the ablest 

1 Dred Scott v. Sandford, 19 Howard 393, Taney, J., p. 407. 

328 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

of their number, dissented in toto from the Chief Justice, 
in an able and masterly opinion which placed him in the 
front rank of jurists. Chief Justice Taney was one of 
the ablest of our judges and in his long career at the 
head of the Federal judiciary was conspicuous for learn- 
ing and judicial ability; but he forfeited the confidence 
and respect of a very large portion of his countrymen 
by the utterance which I have quoted, and the kindred 
expressions which found place in his opinion. The de- 
cision was rendered on March 6, 1857, immediately after 
the inauguration of Buchanan, and from that time it 
was a sheet-anchor for the ship of state while under 
Buchanan's command, against all the efforts and assaults 
of his anti-slavery opponents. 

In the summer of 1858 Douglas, whose pronounced 
opposition to the administration in its policy of forcing 
a pro-slavery constitution upon Kansas, put in jeopardy 
his re-election as United States senator from Illinois, took 
the stump in that State to advocate his own cause. 
Abraham Lincoln came forward as a rival candidate on 
the Republican platform; and the two aspirants entered 
into the most memorable debate in the annals of our 
political history. They went from place to place in Illi- 
nois, addressing the people and asserting the doctrine of 
their respective parties. It was on the eve of this series 
of debates that Lincoln, in a speech at Springfield accept- 
ing the nomination for senator, uttered, against the ad- 
vice of his friends, the sentence which at once became 
famous: "A house divided against itself can not stand. 

329 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

I believe this government can not endure half-slave and 
half-free." This caused a great outcry against Lincoln, 
and, throughout the ensuing debate, was the keynote of 
the harangues of Douglas against what he persisted in 
branding as the unconstitutional and abolitionary doc- 
trines of his opponent. But Lincoln bravely adhered to 
his text and laid before the people of the North a clear 
and statesman-like declaration of the principle that while 
slavery was a sectional and local institution, freedom was 
truly national and should control. Although Lincoln had 
been a representative in Congress from Illinois, he really 
first came into full view during the progress of his debates 
with Douglas. While he failed in his campaign and his 
rival was elected to the Senate, Lincoln took his place 
then as one of the foremost and strongest of the leaders 
of the Republican party. 

About the same time Seward gave utterance to a dec- 
laration very similar to Lincoln's, when he said, in a 
speech at Rochester, that between freedom and slavery 
there was an " irrepressible conflict." This conflict was 
at fever heat in 1859. On tne J 7 tn °f October of that 
year the country was startled by the news of John Brown's 
raid into Virginia. He captured the arsenal at Harper's 
Ferry, took possession of the bridge which crosses the 
Potomac, fortifying it with cannon, cut the telegraph 
wires, stopped the trains, killed several men and seized 
many prominent citizens, who were held as hostages. 
The invading force did not exceed twenty-two men, in- 
cluding Brown, his sons and son-in-law. It was soon 

330 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

overpowered, the leader and his followers were captured, 
and Brown, after trial and conviction, was hanged on De- 
cember 2, 1859. 

From all the facts afterwards disclosed, it is clear that 
the final and desperate scheme of John Brown, the in- 
sane folly of which was only equaled by the dogged 
pertinacity with which he clung to his determination to 
execute it, had been the chief subject of his meditations 
and resolves for a score of years. He communicated his 
plans in part to a few friends in New York and New 
England, from whom he received sympathy and money to 
aid him in his efforts, whatever they might be, but who 
were without definite knowledge of his intention to make 
war against the State of Virginia and the Federal Gov- 
ernment by an armed invasion, in support of which he 
expected slaves to rally at his call and assert their right to 
freedom. After maturing his plans he was obliged to 
abandon them for a time, owing to the treachery of one 
of his comrades, who gave information that prevented 
his obtaining a quantity of rifles with which to arm his 
band. But at last he overcame all obstacles and satisfied 
himself that the hour of vengeance and victory had come. 
It seems almost incredible that good men such as Gerrit 
Smith, Theodore Parker, and Samuel G. Howe should 
have been willing to give aid and comfort to Brown, 
knowing, as they did, that whatever his purposes were, 
his life was devoted to fighting the slave power, and 
securing freedom, by force only, and on his individual 
responsibility. 

33i 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

During the interval between the first plan of attack 
and his actual invasion of Virginia, Brown had done some 
bloody work in Kansas, and captured and carried off 
from their owner five slaves whom he brought safely to 
Canada — an action which his friend Doctor Howe had 
condemned. Brown was possessed by that kind of fanat- 
icism which absorbs the entire faculties of its victim 
and creates in him the illusion that he is a chosen in- 
strument to work out some particular plan of divine 
retribution. The prevailing sentiment of the country, 
North and South, was that of horror at this senseless 
and criminal enterprise. The calmness and courage of 
its leader in undergoing his trial and meeting his fate 
on the scaffold excited much natural sympathy and ad- 
miration; and that can hardly be called a perversion of 
hero-worship which, in spite of his crimes, had placed 
John Brown's name among the immortals as a martyr in 
the cause of freedom. When the stage of real war for the 
salvation of the Union was reached, it was soon found 
that John Brown's name was to be linked with the music 
of the regiments as they marched to the front; and 
probably there never was a refrain more universally on 
the lips of soldiers than that which perpetuates the mem- 
ory of the stern and vengeful old Puritan of Ossawatomie: 

" John Brown's body lies a-mould'ring in the grave, 
But his soul goes marching on." 

Abraham Lincoln came to New York in February, 
i860, and on the 27th of that month delivered in Cooper 

331 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Union the famous speech which, perhaps more than any- 
thing else, contributed to his nomination for the presi- 
dency by the Republican party. His ungainly figure, 
his awkward manners, and his unpolished style of oratory, 
were no hindrance to the profound impression made by 
his clear historical review of the rise and progress of the 
slave power, and the cogent arguments by which he 
proved that slavery was sectional and freedom national. 
My partner, Hiram Barney, who was his warm friend, 
took care of Mr. Lincoln while he was in New York, and 
on Sunday offered him the alternative of going in the 
afternoon to a service in a prominent up-town church or 
to the Five Points House of Industry, where the exercises 
of the children gathered in that institution were to be 
held under the direction of the Superintendent, Mr. 
Pease. Mr. Lincoln decided in favor of the House of 
Industry. He was introduced to the Superintendent by 
Mr. Barney, and was requested to say a few words to the 
children. He said he was unaccustomed to that kind of 
address, but consented to speak to the boys and girls, 
which he did, giving them a few words of sound advice. 
A stranger, then arose from the audience, and said to 
the children that he would tell them a story about a 
Western boy who, from the most humble circumstances, 
had, by his industry, honesty and perseverance, gained 
the esteem and confidence of every one in the community 
where he lived, and had risen to be one of its first and 
most honored citizens, and that many of them thought it 
likely he might become the next President of the United 

333 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

States. He brought his little speech to a climax by 
telling them that the boy whose struggles and successes 
he had recounted was the man who had just addressed 
them. 

Three months after Lincoln had been listened to in 
Cooper Union with mingled curiosity, surprise and admi- 
ration, the Republican convention assembled at Chicago. 
Although Lincoln had gained ground, not only in New 
York but also in New England and the West, it was, I 
think, the general opinion among Northern Republicans 
that Governor Seward would receive the nomination for 
the presidency. The latter had been for many years a 
bold, consistent and able leader in his own State and in 
the Senate of the United States against the steady aggres- 
sion of the slave power, and it may be said that he de- 
served to lead the Republican party to what reasonably 
seemed, in view of the hopeless divisions both of the Demo- 
crats and Whigs, a certain victory. But strong opposition 
to Governor Seward existed in his own State and else- 
where. In his whole political career he had been largely 
under the influence and guidance of Thurlow Weed, a 
guiding spirit of the Whig party and its members, who, 
like Governor Seward, had, with much reluctance, enlisted 
in the Republican ranks. Weed was a man of great 
ability, an ardent friend of Seward, and devoted to his in- 
terests. While always refusing to take office of any kind, 
State or Federal, he exerted almost unlimited control over 
the legislature at Albany, where the advice and help of the 
"Old Man," as he was familiarly termed, was often sought 

334 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

by the Whig merchants of New York to guard them 
against threatened legislative measures, and also by a class 
of men who, in the parlance of the present day, would 
be styled "promoters." 

Among other schemes aided by Thurlow Weed was 
the procurement from the legislature of charters for street 
railroads. As counsel for property owners who resisted 
in the courts for several years the validity of the acts 
of the legislature by which the public streets in a great 
metropolis were given to the railroad companies without 
compensation, I could not in the course of the litigation 
but be made aware of the methods by which franchises 
of such great value were procured. The identification of 
Thurlow Weed with these street railroad companies and 
the easy-going acquiescence of Governor Seward with 
other schemes for making public property subserve the 
interests of private parties, gave ground for serious criti- 
cism and apprehension, in view of Seward's candidacy 
for the presidential nomination. These criticisms were 
made, though doubtless the facts on which they were 
based were misrepresented and exaggerated. I, for my 
own part, would not impute to either Governor Seward 
or Mr. Weed anything more than a too liberal applica- 
tion, in their dealings with matters affecting their polit- 
ical and personal allies, of that principle which the Whig 
party had maintained, of aiding internal and local im- 
provements by legislative favor. 

It is certain that Seward himself confidently expected 
that he would be the choice of the convention. He left 

335 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Washington shortly before it convened, telling Senator 
Wilson that he would not resume his seat in the Senate 
until after his nomination. After the balloting began at 
Chicago the result was communicated to him by telegraph 
at his home at Auburn, where he was surrounded by 
neighbors and friends who, like himself, expected his 
nomination as a foregone conclusion. A friend and fel- 
low-townsman of Governor Seward, who lived near him, 
afterwards gave me an account of the evening in Auburn. 
The Seward mansion was illuminated and opened, and 
the villagers were ready to congratulate their most promi- 
nent citizen upon his nomination for the first place in the 
nation. Of the 233 votes required for the nomination, 
Seward, on the first ballot, received only 173I, lacking 
59I votes of the required number. Lincoln came next 
with 102, while Cameron, Chase and Bates had 50^, 49, 
and 48, respectively, the remaining votes being scattered. 
On the second ballot Seward's lead increased to 184I 
against 181 for Lincoln, and on the third ballot all the 
opposition to Seward was concentrated in favor of Lincoln, 
who was, thereupon, unanimously nominated. Hannibal 
Hamlin, of Maine, was selected as the candidate for vice- 
president. 

To Seward and his friends, who had expected his nom- 
ination on the first ballot, this was a crushing blow. One 
by one the neighbors, who had come to greet him as the 
choice of the convention, took leave of him in grief and 
silence. He alone preserved a calm and dignified manner, 
though he did not conceal his great disappointment. The 

33b 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

lights were extinguished, the people retired to their homes, 
and the general feeling was that they were under the 
shadow of a great calamity. 

The nomination of Lincoln was, to a large extent, a 
surprise to the public and to the Republican party. A 
great deal of explanation was required to account for his 
overwhelming strength in the convention; but the result 
was soon accepted as the wisest which could have been 
reached. The political campaign of i860 was marked 
chiefly by the enthusiasm with which, in all the Northern 
States, the Republicans and the papers whose sympathies 
were with them, rallied to the support of a cause and a 
leader for whom victory was well assured. 

The Democratic party was rent in twain by the con- 
flicting opinions of its leaders. Its convention at Charles- 
ton divided into two factions, each of which, after being 
separately organized, adjourned without nominating can- 
didates for the presidency. Later on, the extreme pro- 
slavery division met at Baltimore and put in nomination 
John C. Breckinridge, of Kentucky, and Joseph Lane, of 
Oregon, while the Douglas Democrats, who met at the 
same place, named their old leader for the presidency. 
Herschel V. Johnson, of Georgia, was afterwards asso- 
ciated with him as the candidate for vice-president. A 
remnant of the old Whig party put in nomination John 
Bell, of Tennessee, and Edward Everett, of Massachusetts. 

The Republican platform was, in substance, a declar- 
ation of the principles enunciated at Buffalo, in 1848, by 
the Free Soil convention. It maintained the inviolabil- 

337 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

ity of the rights of the States, but denounced the Demo- 
cratic doctrine that Congress was without power to 
prohibit slavery in the territories, and included a con- 
demnation of the Douglas "Popular Sovereignty." Its 
framers showed great wisdom in omitting any reference 
to the Dred Scott decision or to the Fugitive Slave Law. 
A simple declaration condemned John Brown's raid as a 
crime. The people in the North saw in this exposition 
of Republican principles solid ground on which they 
could unite and stand in defence of the Union and free 
territory. Everything favored a Republican triumph. 
The stars in their courses fought against the evil genius 
of slavery extension. Lincoln and Hamlin received 180 
electoral votes out of 303. Lincoln had nearly 500,000 
votes more than Douglas, but not enough to give him 
a popular majority over all the other candidates. 



338 



CHAPTER XXII 

PRESIDENT BUCHANAN DAZED — HIS CABINET — SECESSION OF SOUTH CARO- 
LINA — FORT SUMTER — LINCOLN'S INAUGURATION — HIS CABINET — 
RELIEF OF SUMTER — OPENING OF THE WAR — HIRAM BARNEY — THE 
PROPOSED PROCLAMATION OF EMANCIPATION — ATTITUDE* OF FOREIGN 
GOVERNMENTS — ENGLAND AND THE REBELLION — PRIVATEERS. 

THE years from 1861 to 1865 cover the period of 
the deadly struggle for the integrity or the disrup- 
tion of the Union which has been variously termed the 
"War of the Rebellion," "The War for the Union," 
"The Civil War" and "The War between the States." 
I do not intend to go into any details of the war, with its 
varying fortunes. I have traced, very inadequately, the 
progress of the slave power, in its continuous and untiring 
demands, in order to show that the inevitable conse- 
quence must have been either the breaking up of the 
Union of the States to secure the supremacy of slavery 
in the South, or the maintenance of the Union by force 
of arms. 

The election of a Republican President made secession, 
which had, up to that time, been only a threat, an actual 
reality. Caught between the upper and nether mill- 
stones of freedom and slavery, President Buchanan ap- 
pears to have been completely dazed and baffled by the 
dangers and perplexities which confronted him, and his 

339 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

officials acts and omissions indicated a hopeless inability 
to meet the exigencies of the time. He held to the in- 
tegrity of the Union as binding on all its citizens, and 
denied the right of secession by any State. He held, 
however, with equal tenacity to the view that the Federal 
Government could not coerce a State to remain in the 
Union against its will, that while it was unlawful for a 
State to withdraw from the Union, it was unlawful for 
the Union to prevent the withdrawal of a State. Of 
his cabinet, Howell Cobb, Secretary of the Treasury, was 
from Georgia; John B. Floyd, Secretary of War, from 
Virginia; and Jacob Thompson, Secretary of the Interior, 
from Mississippi. Sympathizing with these Southerners 
was Isaac Toucey of Connecticut, Secretary of the Navy. 
Governor Cass, Secretary of State, shrank from facing 
the impending peril, and retired within a few days after 
the resignation of Cobb, who went to Georgia to aid the 
forces of secession and was followed by the other Southern 
members of the cabinet. Joseph Holt, of Kentucky, a 
border-State man, was true to the Union, while Jeremiah 
S. Black, the Attorney-General, was a thorough-going 
patriot as well as a learned jurist. 

The cabinet, being thus "a house divided against it- 
self," could not stand. For a time President Buchanan 
yielded to the sinister influences by which he was sur- 
rounded, not only in his cabinet but also in Congress. 
But when the places left vacant in the cabinet had been 
filled, necessarily by Northern men, such as John A. Dix, 
of New York, Edwin M. Stanton, of Ohio, and Horatio 

34° 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

King, of Maine, his hands were strengthened for more 
decisive action against the threatened disruption of the 
Union. Although of the type of the old-fashioned Jack- 
sonian democracy, the courage of Jackson was not in 
Buchanan, and he could only deplore the evils which he 
was powerless to avert and which he had not the strength 
to oppose. 

The immediate problems confronting the adminis- 
tration at the opening of the eventful year of 1861 related 
to the forts in the harbor of Charleston. South Carolina, 
always belligerent when her sovereignty was threatened, 
had hastened to take the lead in carrying into execution 
the threat of secession as the consequence of the election 
of a Republican President. On December 20, i860, with 
great pomp and circumstance, the Ordinance of Seces- 
sion was passed by which that State attempted to sever 
the tie which bound her to the Union. The people of 
South Carolina were almost a unit in declaring that the 
Federal Constitution was only a compact between sover- 
eign States and that its violation by the North not only 
justified but compelled the withdrawal of their own com- 
monwealth and its resumption of sovereignty. The three 
forts in the harbor of Charleston were thenceforth regarded 
by the State government of South Carolina as belonging 
to a foreign power, and all the military and civic talent 
and ingenuity of the Palmetto State were directed to 
getting rid of the United States troops in these forts and 
securing the possession of the forts by the State. Com- 
missioners were sent to Washington, negotiations were 

34i 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

carried on by leading friends of the seceded State, Gen- 
eral Scott was called into consultation, the cabinet con- 
sulted, but the President hesitated. Meanwhile Major 
Robert Anderson, every inch a soldier, in command of the 
small garrison in Fort Moultrie, repeatedly informed the 
Washington government of his need of reinforcements and 
provisions. While the long delay was making his reten- 
tion of Fort Moultrie undesirable, he secretly, under cover 
of the darkness of the night, transferred his command 
to Fort Sumter, a superior stronghold, whose guns 
threatened the city of Charleston. This bold stroke 
enraged the people of Charleston, who charged it to be 
an act of bad faith, but Anderson became a military hero 
in the eyes of the North, and his prompt and patriotic 
action had no little effect in stirring up the spirit which 
was needed for the coming strife. Expeditions to relieve 
Fort Sumter were planned in Washington and New York, 
but held in abeyance pending varied and futile efforts in 
the old and tortuous paths of compromise. But com- 
promise was no longer a word to conjure with, and there 
was no Clay or Webster to bring to its aid his magnetic 
power or national sympathy. One by one the Cotton 
States followed the lead of South Carolina and passed or- 
dinances of secession. The feeling of disunion was su- 
preme in the South, while in the North public opinion 
was tending toward a resolute resistance, even to blood, 
against any attempt to overthrow the authority of the 
United States. Thus the administration of Buchanan 
drifted out of power and that of Lincoln succeeded it 

342 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

amid the clouds of darkness which enveloped the country. 

After his election Mr. Lincoln had remained quietly at 
his home in Illinois, receiving visits from leading republi- 
cans and engaged in the task of forming his cabinet. 
He determined to offer the chief places to his most con- 
spicuous rivals for the presidential nomination, Seward, 
Chase, Cameron and Bates. To the protest of a friend 
who said to Mr. Lincoln, "They will eat you up," he 
made the shrewd reply, "They will be just as likely to 
eat each other up," and so the event proved. 

I had a humble share in this business of cabinet-mak- 
ing. We in New York were very anxious that Governor 
Chase should be the Secretary of the Treasury of the 
new administration. When the place was offered to 
him he hesitated to take it. He had made known to one 
of my most intimate friends that he was embarrassed by 
the fact that he had made investments in land in Cincin- 
nati which had proved, for the time, unfortunate, and left 
him in a position where, without considerable pecuniary 
aid, he could not afford to make the sacrifice of giving up 
his professional business and entering the cabinet. I 
laid the matter before my father-in-law, Charles H. Mar- 
shall, then, as always, a true and loyal patriot, a friend 
of Lincoln and Chase, who expressed his willingness to 
advaace, upon the responsibility of that friend and my- 
self, the sum of $25,000, needed to relieve Governor Chase 
from any financial obstacle to his accepting the portfolio 
of the Treasury. The debt, thus created, was duly paid 
at maturity. 

343 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

On his way to Washington Mr. Lincoln came to New 
York, where he was an object of great curiosity. Pass- 
ing down Broadway in an open carriage with bared head, 
he was stared at without any special manifestation of 
enthusiasm. When I first laid eyes on him in the Astor 
House, where he was lodged, his face had already assumed 
that grave and care-worn expression which became more 
and more characteristic of him as the years went on. 
He was on his way to the seat of government, there, as 
its executive head, to take arms against a sea of troubles, 
not knowing whether, by opposing, he could end them. 

The period intervening between the election of Lin- 
coln and the 4th of March, 1861, was one of indescribable 
agitation. It seemed to show the unwisdom of the pro- 
visions of the Constitution which impose a delay of four 
months before an administration put in power by the pop- 
ular vote can enter upon the discharge of its duties. It 
is, of course, idle to speculate as to what might have been, 
but it is certainly true that the chances of reaching a 
peaceable settlement of the national problems would have 
been much better could Lincoln have grasped the reins 
of government with the new year of 1861. 

Lincoln, who had not added materially to his reputa- 
tion by the short and often undignified speeches which 
he made on his way to Washington, and whose entrance 
into the national capital surreptitiously to avoid possible 
plots and conspiracies in Baltimore had excited some ridi- 
cule, now stood forth on the steps of the Capitol and de- 
livered his inaugural address. This was the first of the 

344 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

many declarations which have made his public utter- 
ances, from the moment he took the oath of office to the 
day of his martyrdom, unique and immortal. It is a 
striking and somewhat grotesque instance of the irony 
of fate that Douglas, Lincoln's greatest rival, but in- 
tending to be in the existing crisis his staunch supporter, 
courteously lent his aid to the new President by holding 
his hat while the inaugural address was being delivered. 
It was a trifling thing but very significant. 

Lincoln and his somewhat disjointed cabinet of rival 
statesmen were confronted at once with the unsettled 
question of the relief of Sumter and Major Anderson. 
Negotiations were carried on by Seward with Judge Camp- 
bell, of the Supreme Court of the United States, a represent- 
ative of the South Carolina sovereignty and a secessionist, 
who not long afterward resigned his seat on the bench. 
This only served to entangle still further the already 
complicated dealings between the government of the 
nation and the seceded State. The temporizing policy was, 
for a time, necessarily continued by the new administra- 
tion because it seemed best not to force on South Caro- 
lina any measures which the bellicose commonwealth 
could construe into an act of war. But Lincoln had 
plainly pointed out in his inaugural that while the in- 
coming administration and the Republican party would 
not interfere with slavery in the States, and would respect 
and enforce all existing laws relating to slavery, including 
the Fugitive Slave Law, he would execute all the laws of 
the United States and hold and possess the public property 

345 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

which belonged to them. And he proceeded, cautiously, 
but firmly, to carry out this declaration, and with the 
aid of General Scott and the Navy Department fitted 
out an expedition for the relief of Sumter, to be accom- 
panied by the Brooklyn, an armed vessel of the United 

States. 

Meanwhile public opinion at the North reflected 
every shade of sentiment. The fire-eaters of the South 
had their counterpart in the blatant abolitionists of the 
North; and between these extremes there was in the 
North, far more than in the South, a hesitancy and recoil 
from the idea of civil war, with all its direful forebodings 
of disaster. The sentiment is well described by Oliver 
Wendell Holmes in a letter to the historian Motley, then 
in England. There was, he said, a great uncertainty of 
opinion— almost of principles. "From the impracticable 
abolitionist, as bent on total separation from the South 
as Carolina is on secession from the North, to the Hun- 
ker, or submissionist, or whatever you choose to call the 
wretch who would sacrifice everything and beg the 
South's pardon for offending it, you find all shades of 
opinion in our streets. If Mr. Seward or Mr. Adams 
moves in favor of compromise, the whole Republican 
party sways like a field of grain before the breath of 
either of them. If Mr. Lincoln says he shall execute the 
laws and collect the revenue though the heavens cave in, 
the backs of the Republicans stiffen again, and they take 
down the old revolutionary king's arms and begin to ask 
whether they can be altered to carry minie bullets. . . . 

346 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

The expressions of popular opinion in Virginia and Ten- 
nessee have encouraged greatly those who hope for union 
on the basis of a compromise. " * 

While the general sentiment in the South seemed to 
be that the North would consent to peaceable secession 
by the Southern States rather than fight for the preser- 
vation of the Union, it was almost impossible for the 
North to accept the conclusion that the seceding States 
would throw down the gage of battle against the Federal 
Government. Amidst all the conflicting and agitating 
views and opinions given out from the press, pulpit, and 
the platform and in private talk, indoors and out, there 
suddenly broke in upon those confused voices the startling 
news that the Sumter expedition, although it had reached 
the Bay of Charleston, had, by a mishap, been obliged 
to return to New York; that this had left Anderson and 
his little company unrelieved, and at the point of starva- 
tion, and that General Beaureguard, in command of the 
Rebel forces at Charleston, had opened fire upon Sum- 
ter and was bombarding the fort, gallantly defended by its 
little garrison. The government of the so-called Con- 
federate States, which had been formed at the convention 
held at Montgomery, Alabama, by the adoption of a Con- 
stitution, under which Jefferson Davis had been elected 
President, February 9, 1861, had given no order directly 
authorizing this act of war. But the deed had been done, 
and could not be recalled. Its effect upon the North 
was instantaneous and decisive. All the currents of loy- 

1 Rhodes, "Hist, of United States," vol. Ill, p. 311. 

347 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

alty rushed together, breaking down all barriers, into a 
mighty torrent of patriotic devotion to the Union. 

Just before the firing on Sumter, I dined at the house 
of an eminent lawyer in New York with a number of 
prominent men whose thoughts were all engaged on the 
momentous question of the day. I sat next to a leading 
lawyer, who deprecated very earnestly the idea of a war- 
like issue to settle differences which he thought ought to 
be the subject of compromise. Just after the first shot at 
Sumter I met him at the corner of Broadway and Wall 
Street, and greeting me with outstretched hand he said, 
"I am with you now." This chance expression of a 
changed sentiment wrought by the fateful shot was typi- 
cal of what went on through all the Northern States, 
causing all the hearts of liberty-loving men to throb 
together with a newly awakened spirit of resistance against 
the fratricidal blow which had been aimed at the national 
life. 

Following close on the bombardment of Sumter and 
the capitulation of its garrison, who, after having almost 
entirely exhausted their ammunition and consumed their 
provisions, marched out with colors flying and with the 
final salute to their flag, came the great Union meeting 
in New York held on April 20th, at 3 p.m., in and about 
Union Square. The house of Charles H. Marshall stood 
on the south side of the Square, and on a flagstaff set in 
the roof waved the flag which had floated over Fort Sum- 
ter and had been brought by Major Anderson to New 
York. The appearance of this symbol of the national 

348 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

unity, rejected, insulted and assailed by men who had 
taken up arms against the authority for which it stood, 
excited a great enthusiasm among the vast crowds who 
made up that memorable meeting. The feeling that the 
government must be supported, the rebellion crushed 
and the Union upheld, was overwhelming; and for a 
moment it seemed as if the irresistible strength of the 
North would work a speedy end to treason and rebellion 
in the South. I remember that William H. Appleton, 
then the head of the great publishing house which his 
father Daniel Appleton founded, said to me as we stood 
in the concourse of men at the junction of Broadway and 
Fourteenth Street, "We shall crush out this rebellion as 
an elephant would trample on a mouse. " Not very 
remote in time from this too sanguine expression of loyal 
optimism was the utterance of General William Tecum- 
seh Sherman that the suppression of the rebellion would 
require 300,000 men. Under the prevailing enthusiasm 
of the North in its first outbursts of patriotic zeal there 
were those who did not hesitate to find in this sober and 
prophetic utterance of one of the military leaders, who 
was to have a large share in the victories of the Union 
cause, an indication of insanity and a source of ridicule. 
My partner, Hiram Barney, was appointed by Presi- 
dent Lincoln collector of the Port of New York. This 
was not on any solicitation on the part of Mr. Barney, 
but, as Mr. Lincoln told his cabinet, it was the one ap- 
pointment which he had reserved for himself and upon 
which he was decided. This was a sore disappointment 

349 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

to Mr. Seward, Thurlow Weed, and that wing of the 
Republican party which they specially represented and 
with which Mr. Barney was not in sympathy. They had 
selected for the post of collector and the dispenser of the 
vast patronage connected with the custom-house, Mr. 
Simeon Draper, an active politician, very popular with 
his fellow workers in the Republican organization, and 
prominent in the movements of the party. He was per- 
sistently put forward for the succession when Mr. Bar- 
ney's retirement could be effected as the result of con- 
tinued efforts to that end. The pressure became so 
great that finally, and before the close of President Lin- 
coln's first term, Mr. Barney resigned in order to relieve 
his chief from the embarrassment which his longer re- 
tention of the place would occasion, and Draper, at last, 
in September, 1864, received the coveted appointment. 
Lincoln's personal friendship for Mr. Barney never failed, 
and in the early days of the administration he was often at 
Washington in close consultation with the President and 
Governor Chase; and from him I learned much about 
the anxieties and perils of the new administration. The 
idea of actual war and bloodshed overcame Lincoln with 
the horror of a great darkness. He told Mr. Barney 
that on the night before he was compelled to decisive 
action he could not sleep for the thought of what it meant. 
Calls for men and money — more men and more 
money — now came apace, and were responded to with 
patriotic promptness. The curtain had risen on the 
great drama, the most memorable of the world's civil 

350 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

wars, and its tragic scenes made up the daily staple of 
our lives for four long years. From the first surprising 
and humiliating defeat of the Union Army at Bull Run 
to the final surrender of Lee and the Confederate army at 
Appomattox, the whole story of the war has been told 
and retold a thousand times. Military men and civilians, 
generals of the army and privates in the ranks, newspaper 
correspondents, magazine writers, historians and "penny- 
a-liners" have joined hand and hand, pen and pen, in 
constructing the literature in which are enshrined the 
events of this period of fratricidal strife. 

I shall not attempt to follow the course of the war or 
revive the feelings of depression which followed the de- 
feats of our armies or the elation with which we hailed 
their victories, nor shall I chronicle the battles lost or won 
or take any account, except incidentally, of public affairs 
during the time of the war, as all were bound up in the 
one supreme life and death struggle for the preservation 
of the Union. It has been my aim to set forth, as plainly 
as I could, and in a true light, the steady growth and de- 
velopment of the causes which led to this gigantic strug- 
gle and to the final overthrow of the power that sought 
to work the luin of the Union, and itself perished in the 
mad attempt. The war was, in reality, between slavery 
and freedom. Slavery took the sword and perished by 
the sword. 

All the efforts of the North, at the beginning, to prose- 
cute the war so as not to interfere with the ownership of 
the slaves by their masters were vain and futile. Grad- 

35i 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

ually it became as plain as the sun at noonday that a 
great moral question was involved in the bloody battles 
between the contending armies, and that the triumph 
of the Union armies could not be complete unless it 
brought with it the emancipation of the slaves. The in- 
evitable outcome was so apparent to thinking and pa- 
triotic men in the North that they became impatient under 
what seemed the undue hesitancy of Lincoln to take the 
decisive step of striking the fetters from the slaves. Irri- 
tation at what seemed on his part a culpable neglect of 
a plain duty manifested itself in many forms, including 
open criticism, and private consultations of ardent Union 
men who favored immediate emancipation. To a friend 
of mine who was quite close to the administration, al- 
though not an officer-holder, Lincoln said, "Emancipa- 
tion is my last card, and I will play it when I think best." 
His sense of the overwhelming responsibility laid upon 
him, and his sagacious insight, shaped all his acts in 
dealing with this momentous question. Without haste 
and without rest, he pursued what seemed to him the 
path of duty. 

The Emancipation Proclamation was written long 
before it was promulgated. Referring to what I have 
already related as to the intimacy between President Lin- 
coln and Mr. Barney, I believe it to be a fact that the 
latter was one of the first men, if not the first man, who 
listened to the reading of it by its author. Mr. Barney 
told me that while on a visit to Washington, Mr. Lin- 
coln said to him in the White House that he had some- 

352 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

thing to read to him, but he must do so where they 
would not be disturbed. He accordingly led the way to 
a private room, and, taking a manuscript from his pocket, 
read to Mr. Barney, substantially as it was finally issued, 
the immortal proclamation. The reading was not, how- 
ever, without interruption. Shortly after he began to 
read, Mr. Seward appeared and reminded the President 
that he was under an engagement to attend the funeral of 
an officer of the army and that it was time to go. Mr. 
Lincoln expressed an unwillingness to be disturbed, and 
Mr. Seward retired; but soon afterwards he returned, 
reiterating his request and pleading the importance of 
the President's presence at the funeral; upon which 
Mr. Lincoln positively declined to go and the Secretary 
was obliged to leave him alone with Mr. Barney. 

The years of the war were marked by periods of alter- 
nate hope and fear, depression and exultation. The 
news of reverses to the Union armies was often quickly 
followed by reassuring tidings of signal victories, but af- 
ter the early disasters of the Army of the Potomac and its 
long period of inactivity under the command of McClellan 
it became evident to the North that the struggle would be 
a protracted one. The resources of the South, especially 
the determination of the people and the generalship of 
their military leaders, would require from the North 
the utmost ability, zeal and patriotism to uphold the tot- 
tering Union. The apprehension of intervention on the 
part of England by the recognition of the Southern Con- 
federacy, the unfriendliness of the upper classes, and the 

353 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

enmity of the cotton spinners, were fruitful sources of 
disquiet to our administration and leaders in public affairs, 
while the open sympathy of Napoleon III with the Con- 
federate cause was a constant menace to the Washington 
cabinet. John Bright, the Duke of Argyle, Richard Cob- 
den and others who represented the strong anti-slavery 
spirit of England and who saw that the triumph of the 
South and the disruption of the Union would mean a 
victory for the slave power and a fatal blow at freedom, 
fortunately gave their strong support to the North. This 
kept the British government from giving any direct aid 
or comfort to the Confederacy. The inexcusable negli- 
gence, however, which resulted in the fitting out of the 
Florida and Alabama, as privateers to prey on American 
commerce, and their escape at the very moment when, in 
due course of law, they ought to have been seized and 
condemned, was a sin of omission for which Great Britain 
afterwards paid the penalty of $15,500,000. 



354 



CHAPTER XXIII 

HOME AT NO 1 3 EAST TWELFTH STREET — DOMESTIC EVENTS — SEVEN 
SUMMERS AT NEWBURGH — BATTLE OF BULL RUN — THE UNION ARMY 
— ITS HIGH CHARACTER — FRANKLIN BUTLER CROSBY — POEM ON HIS 
DEATH — "THE MERRIMAC" AND "THE MONITOR" — THE EMANCIPA- 
TION PROCLAMATION. 

DURING the entire period of the war our home was 
at No. 13 East Twelfth Street. I had purchased 
the house early in 1857 and, after making some alterations 
and enlargements, moved into it from Captain Marshall's 
house, where we had been living since the sale of our 
Nineteenth Street house and where our children Howard 
Russell and Mary Marshall were born. A leading motive 
of the purchase of this house was to be near to that of my 
father-in-law, who found it very convenient to pay a 
morning visit for the purpose of seeing his grandchildren, 
in whom he greatly delighted. It was also very easy 
for us to visit him, day and night, and as long as he lived 
we remained in Twelfth Street, but no longer. It was 
here that three of our children were born, Charles Henry, 
Harriet Allen and George Prentiss. We lived in the 
house eight years and then I sold it in 1865 to a Mr. 
Hardenbergh, a brother-in-law of Samuel S. Cox. The 
latter was a member of Congress from Ohio, of national 
reputation, and known as " Sunset" Cox, from a brilliant 
description of a sunset published in a Columbus newspaper 

355 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

of which he was the editor. As he was about to move 
from Ohio to New York, I surmised that he would live 
with Mr. Hardenbergh and become a candidate for Con- 
gress from the strong Democratic district, in which No. 
13 East Twelfth Street was situated; and so it turned out. 
He ran for Congress and was easily elected and re-elected, 
serving until he was appointed Minister to Constantino- 
ple, where, I believe, he enjoyed a special friendship with 
the Sultan. On his return to the United States he was 
again elected to Congress, and served till his death, Sep- 
tember 10, 1889. The statue of Mr. Cox, in Astor Place 
east of the Mercantile Library, was erected by the letter- 
carriers of one hundred and forty cities of the United 
States, in recognition of his services in their behalf in 
Congress. 

We spent seven consecutive summers, including those 
of the war period, at Newburgh-on-the-Hudson, on or 
near Seminary Hill, so called from the large stone building 
occupied as a theological school by a Scotch Presbyterian 
society. The school bears on a large tablet near the 
front door a Hebrew inscription, which my learned friend 
Professor Howard Crosby pronounced to be the motto 
of the Scotch Church: "Burning — but not consumed." 
During the summer it was converted into a boarding- 
house. In 1859, wm l e casting about after the manner 
of city denizens for a place for the summer, I learned in 
some way of this Seminary, and made my way thither to 
prospect for quarters. Just north of the building stood 
a brick house of spacious dimensions and apparently 

356 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

unoccupied. I walked over to it, and gaining the front 
porch, was surprised and almost entranced at the mag- 
nificent view of the Hudson and the Highlands which 
was spread out before us. While engaged in admiring it, 
a man made his appearance, who proved to be the owner 
of the house, Mr. John W. Embler, a well-known resident 
of Newburgh. He informed me that he had recently lost 
his wife, and, having no children, was quite alone in the 
world and in his house. He offered to rent it to me; 
and in a very short time we established the relation of 
landlord and tenant. My family spent two pleasant 
summers in the Embler house and another in a larger 
place a little higher up the hill and our remaining New- 
burgh summers in the Seminary building, the main part 
of which we occupied with the families of my brother 
Benjamin and my sister, Mrs. John P. Crosby. Our 
friend and pastor, the Reverend George L. Prentiss, D.D., 
with his family, was there in 1865. 

The last four of these Newburgh summers were made 
memorable by the varying fortunes of the war, which 
with us, as with the whole people of the country, was the 
one absorbing subject of thought and interest. The news 
of the battle of Bull Run, fought on Sunday, July 21, 
1 861, came as I was taking the train at Fishkill for New 
York. The report was that the Union forces under 
General McDowell had won a victory, but this, on reach- 
ing the city, was found to be false tidings, and was con- 
verted into a record of the defeat and flight of our de- 
moralized army. Gloom and consternation followed this 

357 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

first reverse of the Union arms. Like all defeats it has 
been explained and re-explained, but it stood out at the 
time as a startling revelation of what the war meant, and 
was to continue to mean, to both the contending parties. 
This rude shock to the over-sanguine leaders in the North 
and to the great mass of its citizens came, for the moment, 
with crushing force. But it proved a salutary lesson, and 
overweening confidence was replaced by stern resolution 
and vigorous preparation for a long and bloody strife. 

Many things have been forgiven the South since its 
surrender and its reinstatement in the Union, but it is hard 
to find excuse or palliation for the falsehoods which 
filled the Southern press as to the make-up of the Union 
army when the men of the North responded to Lincoln's 
repeated call for troops. The volunteers who came to 
the front to face the forces of rebellion were described in 
the Southern organs as "discharged operatives, street 
loafers, penniless adventurers," "men without honor, 
honesty or morality, impelled to fight without a single 
worthy or respectable motive." The truth was just the 
reverse of this. Probably no army ever took the field 
superior in manly and moral qualities to those who fol- 
lowed the stars and stripes on the battlefields of the war. 
I may use the characterization of the historian Rhodes, 
who says: "What Everett said of the volunteers of Mass- 
achusetts may be said of the whole Northern army: 
'They have hurried from the lawyer's office, from the 
counting-house, from the artist's studio, in instances not 
a few from the pulpit; they have left the fisher's line 

358 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

upon the reel, the plough in the furrow, the plane on the 
work-bench, the hammer on the anvil, the form upon the 
printing-press — there is not a mechanical art nor a useful 
handicraft that has not its experts in these patriotic 
ranks.'" 1 

The experience of our family circle was similar to that 
of thousands all about us. My father's oldest grandson, 
his namesake Franklin Butler Crosby, a youth of twenty- 
one years, of a noble nature, fine traits and a devoted 
Christian, entered the army, gained the rank of lieutenant, 
was unsparing in his devotion to his duties in camp and 
field and commanded a battery at the battle of Chancel- 
lorsville, where he was killed May 3, 1863. The pregnant 
grief which came to our hearts when, in the bulletin in 
the papers of the day following the battle we read his 
name in the list of the killed, was only one instance of 
thousands of like experiences in the homes of the North. 
I tried to express the feelings which marked the loss of 
this heroic youth in the lines which commemorate his 
death. I reproduce them here that they may be kept 
as an enduring memorial. 

He was our noblest, he was our bravest and best! 

Tell me the post that the bravest ever have filled. 
The front of the fight! It was his. For the rest — 
Read the list of the killed. 

On the crown of the ridge, where the sulphurous crest 

Of the battle-wave broke, in its thunder and flame, 
While his country's badge throbbed with each beat of his breast, 
He faced death when it came. 

1 Rhodes, " Hist, of the United States," vol. Ill, p. 397. 

359 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

His battery planted in front, the Brigadier cried, 

"Who commands it?" as fiercely the foe charged that way; 
Then how proudly our gallant lieutenant replied, 
"I command it today!" 

There he stood by his guns; stout heart, noble form; 

Home and its cherished ones never, never so dear, 
Round him the whirlwind of battle, through the wild storm, 
Duty never so clear. 

Duty, the life of his life, his sole guiding star, 

The best joy of his being, the smile that she gave, 
Her call the music by which he marched to the war, 
Marched to a soldier's grave. 

Too well aimed, with its murderous, demon-like hiss, 

To his heart the swift shot on its errand has flown— 
Call it rather the burning, impetuous kiss 

With which fame weds her own! 

There he fell on the field, the flag waving above, 

Faith blending with joy in his last parting breath, 
To his Savior his soul, to his country the love 
That was stronger than death. 

Ah, how sadly, without him, we go on our way, 

Speaking softer the name that has dropped from our prayers; 
But as we tell the tale to our children today, 
They shall tell it to theirs. 

He is our hero, ever immortal and young, 

With her martyrs his land clasps him now to her breast, 
And with theirs his loved name shall be honored and sung, 
Still our bravest and best! 

Perhaps the gloomiest day in New York, during 
the progress of the war, was the Sunday following the re- 
ceipt of the news of the fearful havoc by the ironclad 

360 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

Merrimac in Hampton Roads. The construction of this 
novel engine of destruction had been going on at Nor- 
folk contemporaneously with work on the ironclad Moni- 
tor, which was being built under the direction of Ericsson, 
who designed it and was preparing it for an attack upon 
the enemy in southern waters. The Merrimac, however, 
got the start in the race of equipping these ironclads, 
whose entrance into national warfare gave the death blow 
to wooden ships, and ushered in the era of iron and steel 
for all vessels of war. Gliding out of the harbor of Nor- 
folk, the Merrimac entered Hampton Roads, March 8, 
1862, and in a short time nearly all the Union ships of 
war on that harbor had been set on fire by the shells and 
their sides pierced by her long stem. The frigate Cum- 
berland went down with colors flying, while the Congress 
surrendered. The news of this appalling disaster came 
like a thunderbolt out of a clear sky, and the consterna- 
tion in New York knew no bounds. That Sunday night, 
with Captain Marshall and some other friends, we were 
seated in the library discussing what new disasters might 
come with the expected attack of the Merrimac upon 
the shipping in New York. It was easy to apprehend 
that she would slip past Sandy Hook and through the 
Narrows, destroying all vessels in her path, and levy a 
contribution upon the treasury of the banks and capital- 
ists of New York, dictating terms which could not be 
resisted. While we were holding this gloomy converse, 
the shouts of newsboys, familiar enough in those days 
of excitement, broke on our ears. Hastening to pos- 

361 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

sess ourselves of the "extra" we read, with mingled 
wonder and delight, that the Monitor, in spite of some 
mishaps, had made her maiden voyage to Hampton Roads, 
had met the Merrimac in a life and death struggle, and 
had beaten her off, defeated and disabled, into Norfolk. 
The Merrimac never reappeared, but some time later was 
blown up and destroyed. 

The administration came by slow stages to the goal 
of emancipation. The fear of losing the border States 
was largely the cause of Lincoln's long hesitation to take 
the final step and play his last card. Congress had de- 
clared the war to be solely for the preservation of the 
Union. The war Democrats of the North were anxious 
to exhibit, both their loyalty to the Union and their ad- 
hesion to non-interference with slavery in the States. 
Generals in the field held their own individual opinions 
about slavery, and these opinions were soon made mani- 
fest by their acts. McClellan, a Democrat and anti- 
Abolitionist, returned slaves who straggled into his lines 
to their owners. Butler, of Massachusetts, a Democrat 
up to the time of the war, and a supporter of Jefferson 
Davis in the Charleston convention, but now thorough- 
going in military service as a Union general, took a most 
ingenious method of cutting the Gordian knot by the 
sword. The negroes who entered his lines he declared, 
under the rules of war, were, if regarded as property of 
their owners, contraband of war, and as such he held them, 
setting them to work in the entrenchments. There was a 
certain grim humor about this which was appreciated by 

362 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

the North, and which at once gave the name of "Contra- 
band" to all the negroes within Union lines. The act of 
the General was approved by the War Department. In 
Missouri, Fremont, who was in command of a military 
department, undertook, without orders, to proclaim eman- 
cipation, thereby greatly embarrassing Lincoln and evok- 
ing untimely plaudits from Abolitionists and anti-slavery 
centers, and counter-cries from Democrats in the North 
and in the border States. The result was his removal 
from command and the substitution of General Halleck 
in his place. 

Lincoln made an earnest and sincere effort to deal 
with this momentous problem by proposing and carry- 
ing through Congress a scheme for giving freedom to 
the slaves of loyal owners upon compensation for their 
value, and tendered to the border States an opportunity 
to accept these generous terms. But all in vain; and, 
after exhausting all efforts on this basis, he finally on 
July 22, 1862, read to the cabinet the first Emancipa- 
tion Proclamation. It was a time of discouragement 
and depression at Washington and throughout the North 
for the Union cause, and Seward counseled the President 
to withhold the proclamation until after a success in the 
field had been achieved by the army. The battle of 
Antietam was fought on September 17, in which McClel- 
lan, though not gaining a decided victory, had forced the 
retreat of Lee and his army into Virginia, thus driving 
them back from the soil of Maryland, which they had 
invaded with high hopes of defeating the Federal forces. 

363 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Taking advantage of this favorable turn in military 
affairs, the President issued the proclamation September 
22, 1862. It was tentative in its terms, giving time for 
acceptance of its conditions. These conditions not being 
complied with, the final proclamation was issued January 
1, 1863. By its terms, on that day the sun rose on a 
practically emancipated race. 

The negro of the South may well say, as the chief cap- 
tain Lysias said to Paul: "With a great sum obtained I 
this freedom. " It was at an incredible cost of blood and 
treasure. I have been amazed, while refreshing my recol- 
lection of the war, at the appalling slaughter in its battles 
wherever fought. We knew of it at the time with all its 
ghastly details, but I had not retained more than a vague 
remembrance of their frightful figures. 



3 6 4 



CHAPTER XXIV 

DEATH OF MARTIN VAN BUREN — FUNERAL AT KINDERHOOK — COLUMBIA 
COUNTY LAWYERS — BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF MARTIN VAN BUREN — 
PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF 1 864— GENERAL MC CLELLAN— SPEECH OF 
DR. TYNG — LINCOLN RE-ELECTED — SURRENDER OF LEE — ASSASSI- 
NATION OF LINCOLN — GRIEF OF A NATION — TOM TAYLOR'S POEM IN 
"PUNCH" — JOHN P. CROSBY — HIS DEATH — DEATH OF CAPTAIN MAR- 
SHALL — MEMORIAL — MOVE TO YONKERS — "ROUND OAK" — HOME 
POEMS: "TOM TWIST," " SOMEBODY "—BOOKS AND THE LIBRARY. 

WHILE the armed conflict between the North and 
South was at its height, on July 24, 1862, Mr. Van 
Buren died at Lindenwald. In company with Samuel 
J. Tilden, I went from New York to Kinderhook to at- 
tend the funeral. We left the railroad at Hudson, hired 
a buggy and drove to the village, a distance of about nine 
miles, a lovely drive past the yellow fields just ready for 
the harvest, towards the heart of the fertile County of 
Columbia. How fertile it had been in great men, the 
greatest of whom had just been gathered by the reaper, 
Death! 1 We skirted the wide lawns of Lindenwald, 

1 Peyton F. Miller, a son of Judge Theodore Miller of the Court of Appeals 
of New York, has written a book entitled "A Group of Great Lawyers of 
Columbia County, New York," in which he reviews the lives of the following, 
all of whom were either born or practiced law in that county. 

Martin Van Buren, Samuel J. Tilden, Robert Livingston, Robert R. Living- 
ston (Chancellor), Peter Van Schaack, Edward Livingston, Robert R. Living- 
ston, Peter Silvester, John Bay, Ambrose Spencer, Jacob Rutsen Van Rens- 
selaer, Elisha Williams, Daniel Cady, John P. Van Ness, William P. Van 

365 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

across whose sunny sward the last shadow of the funeral 
procession had already passed. As we came to the 
journey's end, the roads were all alive with the crowd of 
country vehicles, pressing toward the same goal. The 
village was full, as if some weighty public interest was at 
stake or some gala day had called all the company to- 
gether; only the flag over the green was at half-mast, the 
bell of the Dutch Reformed Church was tolling, and the 
people wore the serious air of mourners. 

The church was more thronged, I presume, than it 
ever had been before, and there the funeral services were 
held. The village choir rendered Dr. Watts' old-time 
version of the Nineteenth Psalm, and the clergyman, with 
rare good sense, forebore to eulogize, rather teaching the 
grave lessons of patriotism and religious truth which the 
hour demanded. At the close, the vast concourse of 
people passed silently by the bier and took their last look 
on the face of the dead. It would have been hard to find 
a gathering of friends and neighbors more marked by 
the elements of sterling manhood and womanhood than 
this at Kinderhook. Rustic maidens, not a few, with 
faces half flushed with the excitement of a public occa- 
sion, half sobered with its sadness; wholesome, matronly 
women; hale men, who would have delighted the eyes of 
the recruiting sergeant, and veterans as old and even older 
than the departed. All seemed moved with a common 

Ness, Cornelius P. Van Ness, William W. Van Ness, Thomas P. Grosvenor, 
Joseph D. Monell, James Vanderpoel, Aaron Vanderpoel, John C. Spencer, 
Ambrose L. Jordan, Theodore Miller, Benjamin F. Butler, John VV. Edmonds, 
Henry Hogeboom, John Van Buren, Aaron J. Vanderpoel. — Ed. 

366 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

and sincere grief. This was the best tribute that could 
be paid. They felt that they too had shared in the honors 
of their statesman. His fame had made all the neighbor- 
hood famous. He had been the link by which that quiet 
inland center had been bound so long to the great world 
beyond, and now it was broken. Our sorrow is never 
so sincere as when it is a part of ourselves that we have 
lost. 

I have spoken so often of Mr. Van Buren in the earlier 
part of these reminiscences that nothing more need be 
said by me touching his character and his great services 
to his country. After his transient reappearance in the 
arena of politics in 1848, he had remained in private life, 
reverting to his old political associations, passing a con- 
siderable portion of his time in Europe, and ending his 
days amid the tranquil scenes of his country home. 

As Mr. Tilden and I drove back to Hudson our 
thoughts and conversation naturally turned upon the 
terrible conflict raging with unceasing fury. He had little 
faith in the success of the administration in its efforts to 
suppress secession in the South by force of arms. A 
Democrat of the Jacksonian school and a believer in 
party organization as the main source of political power, 
he argued that Jackson's ability to nip in the bud the 
nullification revolution in South Carolina was due to the 
existence of a strong Union party in the South, ready to 
sustain him in his vigorous and patriotic policy. There 
was no Union party in the South to stand behind Lincoln 
and the North, and he was full of forebodings as to the 

367 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

final issue. Like very many men of his way of thinking, 
he failed to reckon on the deep moral sentiment which 
party organization and party leadership are powerless to 
call forth and set in array when merely political issues or 
interests are at stake. 

Reaching the city in the early evening we dined to- 
gether at Delmonico's, then at Fourteenth Street, and later 
on I repaired to Captain Marshall's house, which, at that 
midsummer season, I had pretty much to myself, and 
began to write a biographical sketch of the ex-President 
as a final tribute to his memory. I had but little sleep 
that night, and early in the morning went to Mr. Tilden's 
rooms close by, on the east side of Union Square, to 
gather some dates and data necessary for the completion 
of my sketch. It was published in two numbers of The 
Independent and afterwards by the Appletons in a little 
book under the title of "Martin Van Buren: Lawyer, 
Statesman and Man." Until the publication of Edward 
M. Shepard's admirable biography in 1888 it was the 
only printed memorial of Mr. Van Buren. I was urged 
to undertake the work of a biographer, but was wholly 
unable to accept the task while in the active practice of 
my profession. I yet hope that at some time his still 
unpublished autobiography may be given to the world. 

Notwithstanding the repeated discouragements and 
disappointments caused by the failure of the Army of the 
Potomac under its successive commanders to achieve the 
discomfiture of Lee and the capture of Richmond, the 

368 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

military operations of the Government went on persist- 
ently. The blockade of the Southern ports was actively 
maintained. The capture of Fort Henry and Fort Donel- 
son by General Grant gave a new impulse to the patriot- 
ism of the North and added a new and illustrious name 
to the roll of military chieftains. New Orleans was capt- 
ured and General Butler held it with an iron hand. The 
brilliant campaign of Grant, Sherman and Thomas was 
followed by the transfer of the General-in-chief to the 
leadership of the Army of the Potomac; and the final 
stages of the war were marked by his unrelenting blows 
against the rebel forces in Virginia, by their dogged resist- 
ance, and by the march of Sherman to the sea. 

Pending these successes and before they had been se- 
cured came the presidential election of 1864. The cam- 
paign was almost as eventful in the political field as was 
that of our armies in the actual strife of arms. In the 
Republican party the radicals were in favor of replacing 
Lincoln, on account of what they considered his halting 
policy, by a more energetic Executive, while the conser- 
vatives censured him for his too aggressive action against 
slavery and his abuses of power. The Democrats in their 
turn included all shades of opponents to the administra- 
tion together with a vast number of loyal men who, under 
the name of "War Democrats," believed in the prose- 
cution of the war, but in the main desired to see a Demo- 
crat at the head of the administration. In the end the 
clouds of discord cleared away from the Republican 
skies, and the star of Lincoln was again in the ascendant. 

369 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

The Democratic party resorted to the expedient of 
nominating General McClellan for President on a plat- 
form which denounced the administration and declared the 
war a failure. On the day that this fatal blunder had 
been committed by the Democratic National Convention, 
I was taking a carriage trip through the Catskills with my 
wife. We stopped for dinner at Kingston, in Ulster Coun- 
ty, a strong Democratic center, and there heard of Mc- 
Clellan's nomination. The news created a tumult of ex- 
citement and called forth violent exclamations. At the 
dinner table in the hotel the outpourings of an enthusiast 
of the gentler sex, seated just opposite ourselves, in sup- 
port of the new candidate and against his rival, became so 
disagreeable to our Republican ears that we were forced 
to abandon our seats and establish ourselves at a safe 
distance in another part of the room. 

General McClellan, while always a politician, was too 
much of a patriot to accept the part of the platform of his 
party which proclaimed the war to be a failure, and he 
was placed in the equivocal position of giving the lie to the 
declaration of the Convention which had nominated him. 
In the political campaign of 1864, as too often in his mili- 
tary campaigns, he led his forces to defeat. Lincoln was 
easily elected, receiving 212 out of 233 electoral votes and 
a popular majority of 494,567. 

At an early period of the war, the New York Bible 
Society, of which I was president at the time, organized a 
plan for sending bibles to the soldiers in the field, and we 
held a public meeting in aid of this effort one Sunday 

37° 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

evening in Irving Hall. The house was crowded and 
great interest was manifested by the audience. The chief 
speakers of the evening were the Reverend Roswell D. 
Hitchcock, D.D., a professor and afterwards President of 
Union Theological Seminary, and the Reverend Stephen 
H. Tyng, D.D., then rector of St. George's Episcopal 
Church. Both were popular and effective speakers, and 
well known for their anti-slavery sentiments. Doctor 
Hitchcock made a stirring speech in support of a vigorous 
prosecution of the war, upholding it on its moral side 
and likening the attitude and action of the North to those 
of Samuel when he hewed Agag in pieces before the 
Lord. His hearers responded with hearty applause. Dur- 
ing the interval, between the close of his speech and that 
which Dr. Tyng was to make, a collection was taken up. 
Doctor Tyng, who sat near me on the platform, suggested 
that after such an unseemly exhibition the exercises had 
better be closed with the benediction and the audience 
dismissed. I replied that it was my duty to carry out the 
program, and I should announce him as the next speaker, 
leaving him to settle the question with the audience. I 
accordingly introduced the Doctor, who began with a 
somewhat severe rebuke of what he regarded as unseem- 
ly conduct for a Sunday evening service; but instead of 
declining to speak he launched at once into an invective 
against slavery. "They tell us," said he, "that we ought 
to love slavery because it is a divine institution. So is 
Hell." This unexpected outburst brought down the house 
with a round of applause; and when it ended, the Doctor 

37* 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

who had fairly warmed up to his work, went on making 
his telling points with the vigor which he was accustomed 
to display on the platform; and we had no more protests 
against the Sabbath-day plaudits of the people. 

After the re-election of Lincoln and during the fall 
and winter of 1864-65, the successes of the Union army 
went on apace. Grant, Sherman and Sheridan were the 
military heroes in whom the hopes of the North were cen- 
tered and they did not disappoint those hopes. The fall 
of Richmond and the surrender of Lee at Appomattox 
on April 9, 1865, virtually ended the war. The South, 
as General Grant said in one of his most famous utter- 
ances, had "robbed the cradle and the grave" in its des- 
perate efforts to prolong the war and support its tottering 
cause. It had neither the men nor the money for fresh 
campaigns of invasion, or for the defense of its strong- 
holds in the interior or on the sea coasts. The van- 
quished forces gave up the strife and were at the mercy of 
the victors. The generous action of General Grant, after 
Lee's surrender, in allowing Lee's men to keep their 
horses because they would need them for the peaceful 
occupations to which they must return, exchanging the 
sword for the plowshare, struck the keynote of the mag- 
nanimity of the North toward the defeated South. In 
the first flush of the triumph, so long delayed and so dearly 
won, there was a vengeful feeling which would have 
brought the chief leaders of the Rebellion to the scaffold; 
but the mood of medieval vengeance held no sway, and 

371 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

soon gave place to a feeling which called only for such re- 
strictions to full citizenship as the interests of the restored 
Union required. Lincoln, had he lived, would doubtless 
have shown, in his policy of reconstruction, the same 
large-minded and large-hearted patriotism that he had 
shown during the war. But only six weeks intervened 
between his second inauguration on March 4, 1865, and 
his assassination on April 14. 

No one event of a public nature which I can recall 
during the whole course of my life brought with it such 
an overwhelming sense of grief and gloom as this. We 
had become familiar with the war and all its distressing 
horrors, with the slaughter of brave men on sea and shore 
and with the grief brought into innumerable homes by 
these deadly encounters. But the idea of assassination 
was foreign to American thought and abhorrent to our 
feelings. The taking-off of Lincoln by a murderous and 
fatal shot, and the attempt upon the life of Secretary 
Seward, as a part of a plot to assassinate both the Presi- 
dent and the chief member of his cabinet, was something 
which had no precedent in our history. 

I doubt if any public man was mourned by the peo- 
ple whom he served as was Lincoln. He took at once the 
character of a martyr. All his faults and shortcomings 
were forgotten, and he stood forth in all the rugged gran- 
deur of his nature. By his patience, his caution, his cour- 
age and his patriotism, he had saved the Union at the cost 
of his own life, and this was all the more thought of on 
that fatal day which brought the news of the tragedy in 

373 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Ford's theater. New York, which had gone wild with 
illuminations and fireworks when Richmond fell and the 
South gave up the fight, was now draped with the symbols 
of mourning. The grief was not only general but gen- 
uine. Its expressions were like those, touchingly de- 
scribed by Southey in his incomparable life of Nelson, 
which the English people showed when their great naval 
hero died, but with this difference: Nelson's life went out 
in a blaze of glory, Lincoln's in the blackness and dark- 
ness of a foul conspiracy. Even in England, where the 
higher the social rank the more pronounced had been the 
aversion to the cause of the Union, there came a great 
revulsion of feeling. This is, perhaps, nowhere better 
shown than in Tom Taylor's remarkable poem which 
appeared in Punch, May 6, 1865, a noble recantation of 
long-continued sarcasm and abuse. It faces a cartoon in 
which Britannia, as the central figure, places a wreath on 
the brow of Lincoln as he lies in death, while at his feet sits 
a negro with a broken chain, a symbol of emancipation, 
and at the pillow of the death-bed, Columbia bows her 
head in speechless sorrow. These are the opening lines: 

YOU lay a wreath on murdered Lincoln's bier, 
YOU, who with mocking pencil wont to trace, 

Broad for the self-complacent British sneer, 

His length of shambling limb, his furrowed face, 

His gaunt, gnarled hands, his unkempt, bristling hair, 

His garb uncouth, his bearing ill at ease, 
His lack of all we prize as debonair, 
Of power or will to shine, of art to please. 

374 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

YOU, whose smart pen backed up the pencil's laugh, 
Judging each step, as though the way were plain: 

Reckless, so it could point its paragraph, 
Of chief's perplexity, or people's pain. 

Beside this corpse, that bears for winding sheet 
The Stars and Stripes he lived to rear anew, 

Between the mourners at his head and feet, 
Say, scurril jester, is there room for you? 

Yes, he had lived to shame me from my sneer, 
To lame my pencil, and confute my pen — 

To make me own this hind of princes peer, 
This rail-splitter a true born king of men. 

Profiting by the universal sentiment aroused by the 
martyrdom of Lincoln, which, for the moment, effaced 
the bitterness of partisanship, immediate steps were ta- 
ken by Republican citizens to secure a site in Union 
Square for the statue which, while inadequate as a work 
of art, remains a perpetual memorial of Lincoln, a fitting 
counterpart to the equestrian statue of Washington on the 
eastern side of the same square. 

Our last summer at Newburgh, 1865, was spent in the 
Seminary building where our sojourn was made excep- 
tionally pleasant by the companionship of our friends, 
Dr. and Mrs. Prentiss and their family, and where, on 
July 27, our eighth child, John Crosby Butler, was born. 
He was named after John P. Crosby who married my 
eldest sister Margaret in 1840 and had endeared himself 
greatly to all our family. Mr. Crosby was a lawyer of 
excellent repute. My father made him an associate in 

375 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

his new law business and gave him the inspiration of 
his example. As I have already related, it was his eldest 
son, Franklin Butler Crosby, who was killed at Chancel- 
lorsville. Mr. Crosby, himself, was destined to a tragic 
death. While bathing in the surf at Fire Island, Septem- 
ber 19, 1876, he was drowned, and, notwithstanding long 
search and offered rewards, his body was never recovered. 
He had a noble and generous nature and a high Christian 
character. The bar of New York took special note of 
his death and warm tributes were paid to his memory by 
his brethren of the profession. 

We had become so attached to our summer home at 
Newburgh that I was quite willing to accede to my wife's 
wish to secure a permanent dwelling-place for a part of 
the year on a ridge northwest of the Seminary and on a 
considerably higher elevation, where several houses had 
been built by friends of ours. One of these was apparently 
willing to allow us to become his successors in title, and 
accepted an offer which I made him; but almost imme- 
diately afterward he changed his mind. 

In September of this year we were hastily summoned 
to New York by the alarming illness of Captain Marshall, 
which soon had a fatal issue. He died September 23, all 
his children being at his bedside. He was buried from the 
Second Avenue Presbyterian Church, of which the Rev- 
erend Asa D. Smith was then the paster. Dr. Prentiss 
made the address, and spoke in most impressive and fitting 
terms of the life and character of the friend whose virtues 
and whose love of country had been so conspicuous in the 

37 6 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

community whose progress he had for so many years, 
helped to promote. The exposures of his earlier life dur- 
ing a period between the ages of fourteen and forty-four, in 
which he followed the sea from cabin-boy to commander of 
the highest class of sailing vessels, had doubtless told upon 
his strong constitution, which might otherwise have easily 
brought him to fourscore years. The great anxieties of the 
war, coupled with his intense grief at the death of Lincoln, 
contributed to the breaking down of his physical strength, 
bringing him to the end of his earthly life while he was 
only three years beyond threescore and ten. He was 
one of the founders of the Union League Club, and, at 
the time of his death, its president. While the war was 
in progress his evenings were, for the most part, spent in 
the Club, which then occupied its earliest home on the 
corner of Seventeenth Street and Broadway, facing Union 
Square, where the patriotism and loyalty of its members 
were busy in devising means for supporting the Govern- 
ment, and providing every measure for the prosecution 
of the war and the triumph of the Union cause. 

[My father here speaks of the patriotism and loyalty 
of the members of the Union League Club. The Club 
itself, spoke in like terms of my father, in the following 
memorial resolution adopted after his death. — Ed.] 

"Mr. Butler became a member of The Union League 
Club on the sixth of March 1863, on the nomination of 
William J. Hoppin, subsequently President of the Club. 

" He was in the large group of important men admitted 
to membership one month after its organization and with 
them bore his honorable part in the patriotic work per- 

377 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

formed by the Club. He continued his membership to 
the end of his life. 

"He was Chairman of the Library Committee in 1865, 
and to his efforts the establishment of the library is under- 
stood to have been mainly due. Mr. Butler during his 
long membership, did not swerve in the least from the 
high purpose upon which this Club was established. 

"He never filled a political office, but he did hold all 
his rare qualities and powers at the service of any worthy 
cause, and performed with energy and fidelity all such 
public duties as his associates cast upon him. 

"While he never sought place or position, he willingly 
accepted invitations to perform any duty properly de- 
volving upon a man of his importance. 

"The quiet unostentatious connection of men like Mr. 
Butler with this Club, adds greatly to its influence and 
power, and while not attracting noisy attention, the fact of 
such connection is, in the highest degree, valuable and 
important." 

Captain Marshall took to heart everything that seemed 
to him like delay, irresolution, or error on the part of the 
administration, and at times was shaken in his faith in Lin- 
coln and almost despaired of the Republic. In this he 
shared in the general apprehensions which filled the minds 
of the most loyal and aggressive of the Republican leaders. 
He was impatient of what he thought the halting policy at 
Washington. Over and over again he urged me to use 
my pen in the interest of a more radical and vigorous course 
of action. But gradually he came to see, as we all did, 
that raw haste is half-sister to delay, and that the gigantic 
struggle of the civil war could not be hurried to a close. 
Such men as Captain Marshall, in the central places of 
moral influence and financial resources, were towers of 

378 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

strength to the Government in those dark days of alternate 
victory and defeat, and no private citizen in New York did 
more than he to uphold the administration, support its 
policy and hasten the day of its final triumph. 

The memorial printed by D. Appleton & Co., shortly 
after Captain Marshall's death, contains my brief bio- 
graphical sketch of him, in which is included his own 
short narrative of his early life and its many eventful 
incidents, written in a simple style but making the story 
for this reason all the more attractive and interesting. 
His was a life of honest toil and persevering effort. His 
example of integrity, fidelity to duty and devotion to his 
country ought not to be lost on any of his descendants. 

After the death of Captain Marshall we never returned 
to our home in Twelfth Street. Having failed in the 
proposed purchase at Newburgh and having sold the 
New York house, we determined to pass the winter out 
of the city, and looked about for a suburban residence. 
Going to Yonkers on this quest, we looked at a number 
of houses and were especially attracted to one on Palisade 
Avenue, then as now surrounded by centennial oaks which 
the hand of time had spared and against which no ax had 
been lifted. Stepping out on the veranda in the rear of 
the house, we had our first introduction to the noble view 
of the Hudson, from the Palisades, just opposite, to the 
hills of Staten Island, more than twenty-five miles away. 
It was a case of love at first sight; for from that time un- 
til now this outlook has never failed to be "a thing of 
beauty "and "a joy for ever." 

379 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

But I had, at that time, no thought of becoming the 
permanent possessor of the place, which I had rented only 
for the winter, expecting to return to the city as our per- 
manent future abode. The house was not then well 
adapted for a winter home. A small furnace at the south 
end of the cellar was the only means of heating, aside from 
open fireplaces, and the rooms on the north side of the 
house were almost uninhabitable during the exceptionally 
cold winter of 1865-66. It was evident that to convert 
this building into a comfortable habitation a work of recon- 
struction must be entered upon, almost as radical as that 
which had been undertaken by the government in the 
Southern States as a sequel to the war. Nevertheless, in 
our family, notably among the children, who formed the 
majority, all views favored the purchase of the place, and 
making it our home for all the year round ; and so, after 
much discussion, I became the owner in fee of the prem- 
ises which I had leased, and exchanged my holding as 
a tenant into an absolute title. 

We christened the place "Round Oak" in honor of 
the noble and singularly symmetrical white oak which 
stood in front of the house and which seems to the eye 
hardly larger at the present writing than it did almost 
thirty-five years ago when it passed, by the deed, with the 
land into which it first struck its roots over a century ago. 

[It was here at "Round Oak" that occasions arose, 
also notably among the children, for the poems that were 
printed in 1897 for private circulation, in a small volume 
appropriately called "Home Poems." Some of them had 

380 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

been published in magazines and had also found their 
way into school readers. The two most popular being 
"Tom Twist" and "Somebody." The former is here 
reproduced, and several verses of the latter are quoted 
in Judge Holt's Memorial on page 408 post. 

It was at "Round Oak" that there occurred on August 
22, 1866, the death of John Crosby Butler, aged a little 
over one year. Here too were born Margaret Crosby 
Butler and Arthur Wellman Butler. — Ed.] 



TOM TWIST 



Tom Twist was a wonderful fellow, 

No boy was so nimble and strong; 
He could turn ten summersets backward, 

And stand on his head all day long; 
No wrestling, or leaping, or running, 

This tough little urchin could tire; 
His muscles were all gutta-percha, 

And his sinews bundles of wire. 



Tom Twist liked the life of a sailor, 

So off, with a hop and a skip, 
He went to a Nantucket captain, 

Who took him on board of his ship; 
The vessel was crowded with seamen, 

Young, old, stout and slim, short and tall, 
But in climbing and swinging and jumping, 

Tom Twist was ahead of them all. 



He could scamper all through the rigging, 

As spry and as still as a cat, 
While as for a jump from the maintop 

To deck, he thought nothing of that; 
He danced at the end of the yard-arm, 

Slept sound in the bend of a sail, 
And hung by his legs from the bowsprit, 

When the wind was blowing a gale. 

381 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

The vessel went down in a tempest, 

A thousand fathoms or more, 
But Tom Twist dived under the breakers, 

And swimming five miles got ashore; 
The shore was a cannibal island, 

The natives were hungry enough, 
But they felt of Tommy all over, 

And found him entirely too tough. 

So they put him into a boy-coop, 

Just to fatten him up, you see, 
But Tommy crept out, very slyly, 

And climbed to the top of a tree; 
The tree was the nest of a Condor, 

A bird with prodigious big wings, 
Who lived upon boa-constrictors, 

And other digestible things. 



*&^ 



The Condor flew home in the evening, 

And there lay friend Tommy, so snug, 
She thought she had pounced on a very 

Remarkable species of bug; 
She soon woke him up with her pecking, 

But Tommy gave one of his springs, 
And leaped on the back of the Condor, 

Between her long neck and her wings. 

The Condor tried plunging and pitching, 

But Tommy held on with firm hand, 
Then off, with a scream, flew the Condor, 

Over forest and ocean and land; 
By and by she got tired of her burden 

And flying quite close to the ground, 
Tom untwisted his legs from the creature, 

And quickly slipped off with a bound. 

He landed all right and feet foremost, 
A little confused by his fall, 

And then ascertained he had lighted 
On top of the great Chinese Wall; 

382 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

He walked to the City of Pekin 

Where he made the Chinamen grin; 

He turned ten summersets backward, 
And they made him a Mandarin! 

Then Tom had to play the Celestial, 

And to dangle a long pigtail, 
And he dined on puppies and kittens, 

Till his spirits began to fail; 
Then he sighed for his native country, 

And he longed for its ham and eggs, 
And in turning summersets backwards 

His pigtail would catch in his legs. 

He sailed for his dear home and harbor, 

The house of his mother he knew, 
He climbed up the lightning-rod quickly, 

And came down the chimney flue; 
His mother in slumber lay dreaming 

She never would see him more, 
When she opened her eyes and Tommy 

Stood there on the bedroom floor! 

Her night-cap flew off in amazement, 

Her hair stood on end with surprise; 
" What kind of a ghost or a spirit 

Is this that I see with my eyes?" 
"I am your most dutiful Tommy" — 

"I will not believe it," she said, 
"Till you turn ten sommersets backwards, 

And stand half an hour on your head." 

"That thing I will do, dearest mother." 

At once, with a skip and a hop, 
He turned the ten summersets backwards, 

But then was unable to stop! 
The tenth took him out of the window, 

His mother jumped from her bed, 
To see his twentieth summerset 

Take him over the kitchen shed. 

383 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

Then over the patch of potatoes, 

And beyond the church on the hill, 
She saw him tumbling and turning, 

Turning and tumbling still; 
Until Tommy's body diminished 

In size to the head of a pin, 
Spinning away in the distance, 

Where it still continues to spin. 

One motive inducing us to remain in Yonkers was 
to provide for the better accommodation of my libraries, 
both miscellaneous and law. The peculiar pleasure of 
a book-lover is his books. They gradually become mem- 
bers of his household for which, if he does not provide, 
he is, perhaps, not worse than an infidel, but an in- 
excusably negligent guardian. Accordingly the first move- 
ment in the interior reconstruction of "Round Oak" 
was the creation of a library for my miscellaneous books, 
which should not only give them a fitting abode but also 
be an attractive place for the family indoor life. 

If I rightly remember, it is Arthur Helps who says in 
one of his essays that of friendships formed with books 
we never tire, a sentiment none the less true because some- 
what trite. Certain it is that a man given at all to the 
love of letters finds himself, even when seated alone in 
his library, in the choicest companionship. This is espe- 
cially true when the books which are arranged on his 
shelves represent long years of careful collection and in- 
timate acquaintance. 

I began to buy books when I was little more than a 
boy, keeping my treasures on vacant shelves of a large 
wardrobe in my bedroom. Among my early acquisitions 

384 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

of sixty years ago are some of the Pickering Aldine poets, 
bound in quaint morocco and gilt, probably coeval with 
their first publication. These formed the nucleus of my 
collection of the entire set; the later volumes, as I gradu- 
ally picked them up, being bound in accordance with more 
modern standards. In the active years of my professional 
life I never had the time nor the spare cash to follow the 
collectors of first editions and other rare products of the 
press into the alluring and labyrinthine paths in which 
they pursue the objects of their search. While often 
disposed to envy them the pleasures and the trophies of 
their quest, I have never been able to follow them so as 
to share either in the excitement or in the rewards of the 
chase. I have contented myself, for the most part, with 
the best editions of the English classics and of our fore- 
most American authors, with other works chosen from 
the wide fields of literature, giving them the benefit of 
good binding. My edition of Bacon is a good specimen of 
Pickering's handiwork, while many other volumes, large 
and small, exhibit his skill and care in their exterior forms. 
Among other highly valued works I include the fine copy 
of Knight's Shakespeare. 

My law library was at first domiciled in the room 
opposite the library at the southeast corner of the house, 
called the study, but as it increased in the number of 
books, it was, at a later time, established in the basement 
underneath the library. As the new quarters were not 
below ground, but looked out at a level with pleasant 
views, I enjoyed its quiet during many working hours 

385 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

which often ran far into the night. My father's law 
books, which came to me with those relating to American 
history and politics, were supplemented by the ever- 
increasing number of reports, English and American, 
issued by the law publishers to an extent far beyond the 
ability of lawyers to make room for them on the shelves 
of private libraries. In fact, the day of private libraries 
intended as repositories of the books needed to keep pace 
with the requirements of the profession has gone by. It 
was possible fifty years ago to have a fair working library 
in one's house, but as the reports of forty-five States 
claimed recognition the New York lawyer had to content 
himself with having at home reports of his own State 
and of the older commonwealths, and to rely upon the 
public libraries to supplement the deficiencies of his own. 

The change from city to suburb or to a rus in urbe, 
such as Yonkers has become for all the year round, drove 
a deep plowshare through our domestic life and uprooted 
many old ties and habits. Some social sacrifices were in- 
evitable, some family reunions were made impossible, and 
some forms of private intercourse and public service had to 
be abandoned. Moreover, the hours of daily travel from 
house to office, and from office to house, showed an alarm- 
ing proportion of time required for this purpose as com- 
pared with the remainder of the twenty-four hours. But 
in spite of these drawbacks, not unworthy of serious con- 
sideration, I can not doubt that although our change to a 
suburban residence was a violent wrench, with some after- 

386 



A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS 

twinges of regret, it was a wise and beneficent choice. I 
believe it gave to both my wife and myself the prolonged 
lives we have enjoyed, and to our children, and largely to 
our grandchildren, it brought advantages which, in a city, 
would have been impossible. 

If any one wants in good earnest to make trial of a 
suburban life, let him begin his experiment on the eve 
of winter and pursue it resolutely to the vernal equinox. 
If his physical constitution, his natural inclinations, his 
tastes and his temper stand the test of this probation, he 
will be surprised to find how entirely and how easily 
he can thereafter prefer the new life to the old. The 
fact that every great and popular capital has its outlying 
suburbs, more or less endowed with rural charms and 
the ever-varying attractions of nature, and the extent to 
which these are made subservient to the needs of the 
citizens who desire to leave the city for the country, 
show how universal is the craving for a fuller physical 
enjoyment of life than can be found in a metropolis. 

Living in the open, enjoying companionship with nat- 
ure, looking daily upon the broad river with its rocky 
ramparts and upon the myriad forms of plants and flowers, 
of growing shrubs and trees, sleeping in the uncontami- 
nated air and waking amid the glow of dawn, unrestricted 
by the encircling obstructions of the town — these were 
ample compensations for the self-denials which they cost. 

Having been spared to bring my unimportant narra- 
tive down to the close of the war and the removal of our 

387 



WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 

family from the city to our suburban home, I have reached 
a point at which I may close this part of these reminis- 
cences. Should I be prevented from completing the 
whole work, this portion of it which I have been able to 
finish will stand by itself for what it is worth, and to that 
extent will have accomplished the design for which it was 
undertaken. 

[My father had intended to continue his reminiscences 
until the end of the century, but he was able to bring them 
down, in finished and consecutive form, only to 1865. 

During one of his last conversations with us on the sub- 
ject, he repeated the thought embodied in the last sentence 
of this Retrospect: "That part of my work," he said, "giv- 
ing the causes of the Civil War, and events until the time 
of our moving to "Round Oak," is finished, and you may 
do with it what you choose." 

There has been no question as to choice. It has been 
a sacred duty, as well as a grateful task, to prepare these 
pages, not only for those for whom they were intended, 
but also for all others who may wish to share them with 
us. — Ed.] 



3K8 



APPENDIX 



MEMORIAL OF WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER 
BY GEORGE C. HOLT 

READ BEFORE THE ASSOCIATION OF THE BAR OF THE 
CITY OF NEW YORK, MARCH 10, I903 

William Allen Butler was born at Albany, on Feb- 
ruary 20, 1825, and died at Yonkers, on September 9, 1902. 
He was a son of Benjamin F. Butler and Harriet Allen, 
his wife. She was a relative of Lieutenant William How- 
ard Allen of the Navy, for whom William Allen Butler was 
named. 

Benjamin F. Butler was one of the most distinguished 
lawyers of his time. He was Attorney General in the cabinets 
of Presidents Jackson and Van Buren. One of William Allen 
Butler's earliest recollections was of being frequently, when a 
little boy, at the White House, where he was an especial pet 
of President Van Buren. The relations between Mr. Van 
Buren and William Allen Butler during all Mr. Van Buren's 
life were very friendly. Mr. Butler regarded him with great 
esteem and admiration, and after his death, about the beginning 
of the war, Mr. Butler delivered an admirable address on 
"Martin Van Buren, as Lawyer, Statesman and Man," which 
contains a high estimate of his ability and shows the affection- 
ate regard which he felt towards him personally. Mr. Ben- 
jamin F. Butler was one of the authors of the revision of the 
laws of New York of 1830. One of the most interesting oc- 
casions which has ever occurred in this Association was the 
presentation by Mr. William Allen Butler to the Association of 

39 1 



APPENDIX 

portraits of the three revisers, with an address giving a history 
of their lives and of the revision. No one who heard that 
address failed to be deeply impressed by the beautiful tone of 
filial admiration and affection with which he described in it the 
life and professional career of his father. The portrait of Mr. 
Benjamin F. Butler is a copy of the original portrait by Hicks, 
which always hung in Mr. Butler's dining-room at Yonkers. 
It was made by Mr. Howard Russell Butler, who at an early 
age left the profession of the law, in which he had given much 
promise of eminence, for the profession of a painter, in which 
he has achieved marked distinction. He was also the painter 
of the Association's portrait of Mr. William Allen Butler; and 
it is a pleasant fact that these two portraits of Mr. Benjamin 
F. Butler and Mr. William Allen Butler, which are among the 
most excellent that the Association possesses, were painted by 
a grandson of the one and a son of the other. 

After Mr. Benjamin F. Butler ceased to be a member of 
the cabinet of Mr. Van Buren, he settled in New York City, 
and continued to reside there with his family during the rest 
of his life. William Allen Butler was educated at the Uni- 
versity of the City of New York, from which he was graduated 
in the year 1843. He was deeply attached to the University, 
and was highly honored by it. During many years he delivered 
a course of lectures on admiralty law before the Law School of 
the University. He was for many years a member of the 
Council of the University, and after the death of his uncle, Mr. 
Charles Butler, was its president for a considerable time. His 
class since graduation has had a dinner each year, and it is said 
that Mr. Butler attended fifty-five out of the fifty-nine of these 
annual dinners which occurred between his graduation and his 
death. A poem which he read at the fifty-fifth of these dinners 
in 1897 shows the affection which he felt for the college and for 
his class: 

392 



APPENDIX 

"Our Fifty-fifth! Since first, in '43, 
Proud to possess a Bachelor's degree 
And flushed with triumphs of Commencement Day 
We sought, downtown, at Barclay and Broadway, 
The old "American," by Cozzens kept — 
Long since to ruin and oblivion swept — 
And there, with speech and song and all good cheer, 
Pledged one another that each coming year, 
Gathered around the festive board, should see 
The unexampled Class of '43. 

"That day and this long years have rolled between, 
Our thirty-two have dwindled to thirteen, 
And yet the pledge we gave as youngsters then 
Has been well kept and now nine loyal men, 
True to its mandate, gather as of yore, 
Send our best greetings to the absent four, 
Relight the camp-fire as in earlier days, 
Fan its faint embers into heat and blaze, 
And call the roll which grimly seems to say, 
'The boys of old are grandsires of to-day.' 
Too true; we linger waiting on the shore 
From which our comrades all have gone before, 
With short farewells, and while their forms we miss 
We gaze beyond to brighter scenes than this." 

Mr. Butler naturally chose the law for his profession. He 
was brought up in a legal atmosphere. The family's social 
relations were largely among lawyers. One sister married Mr. 
Daniel De Forest Lord and another Mr. John P. Crosby. 

Mr. Butler studied law in the office of his father and was 
admitted to the bar in 1846. His first partner was Hiram 
Barney, who was Collector of the Port of New York during 
the war of the rebellion and in that connection held peculiarly 
intimate relations with Mr. Linclon and his cabinet. Mr. 
Barney was a man of singularly attractive manners, who, in 

393 



APPENDIX 

a long life, knew an unusual number of interesting and dis- 
tinguished people. Few men whom I have ever met were more 
interesting and attractive in conversation, and it is a matter of 
regret that Mr. Barney never wrote out his reminiscences of 
his life. It would have made an unusually attractive book. 

After the firm of Barney & Butler had been in existence 
for some time Mr. James Humphrey, afterwards a member of 
Congress from Brooklyn, was taken into the partnership, the 
name becoming Barney, Humphrey & Butler. After Mr. 
Humphrey's retirement Mr. George W. Parsons was taken 
into the firm, the new style being Barney, Butler & Parsons. 
This firm was succeeded by the firm of Butler, Stillman & 
Hubbard, and by the present firm of Butler, Notman, Joline 
& Mynderse, in which Mr. Butler's oldest son, Mr. William 
Allen Butler, Jr., has been for many years a member. 

During Mr. Butler's entire life the firm with which he was 
connected did a very large law business. Mr. Butler was the 
leading advocate in the firm, but his professional work was not 
at all confined to advocacy. He took also a laborious and active 
part as office counsel and in the general administration of the 
business. In 1850 Mr. Butler married Miss Mary Russell 
Marshall, a daughter of Captain Charles H. Marshall, of the 
famous Black Ball line of packet ships, and who, from 1845 to 
1865, was one of the Board of Pilot Commissioners. Mr. 
Butler became at an early age counsel for this board. The 
regulation of pilotage for the Port of New York, although Con- 
gress has power to regulate it, has usually been left under the 
control of the States. A vicious system of political control in 
the creation and maintenance of the Board of Port Wardens, 
which resulted in terrible disasters on Rockaway Beach and the 
shipwreck of the vessels the Bristol and the Mexico, with the 
loss of many lives, in the years 1836 and 1837, excited a storm of 
public indignation, and the Port Warden system was abolished. 

394 



APPENDIX 

In 1845 the State repealed all its pilotage laws, apparently ex- 
pecting that the matter would be adequately regulated by 
Congress; but it was not. The Chamber of Commerce and the 
Board of Marine Underwriters thereupon formed a voluntary 
association for the licensing and government of pilots, which 
continued until 1853, when the Legislature passed an act creat- 
ing a Board of Commissioners of Pilots, on the basis of the exist- 
ing voluntary organization, providing that three commissioners 
should be elected by the Chamber of Commerce and two by the 
Board of Marine Underwriters. The constitutionality of this 
act was questioned on the ground that the method of the ap- 
pointment of the commissioners by non-political organizations 
was contrary to the Constitution of the State and also on the 
fundamental ground that Congress alone had authority to pass 
laws regulating the subject of pilotage. In the case of Sturgis 
v. Spofford (45 N. Y., 446), Mr. Butler successfully main- 
tained the constitutionality of the law, which has remained in 
force ever since. It is believed that the Pilotage Board affords 
the sole instance in this State of public officers appointed by 
private organizations having no political or public authority. 
It is a matter of public congratulation that a method should 
have been selected for the appointment of this board having in 
charge such important interests in connection with the com- 
merce of this port, which has always kept it free from political 
influences, and Mr. Butler is entitled to much of the credit for 
the establishment and maintenance of the system. Besides 
the regulation of pilotage the board was empowered by the 
Legislature to prevent encroachments on the public piers. In 
the case of People v. Vanderbilt (26 N. Y., 286) Mr. Butler 
succeeded in setting aside a grant made by the Common Coun- 
cil of a pier in the North River and compelled the proprietors 
of private steamship lines to desist from the exclusive possession 
of piers to the injury of general commerce. This led to legis- 

395 



APPENDIX 

Iation establishing the present system permitting the erection 
of sheds on certain piers for the exclusive use of vessels em- 
ployed in regular lines and the setting aside of other piers for 
the general use of commerce. 

Mr. Butler's position as counsel for the Board of Pilot 
Commissioners naturally led to his being frequently retained 
in general admiralty business. He was engaged in a large 
number of the most important admiralty cases brought in his 
time in New York. Among these cases were The Pennsyl- 
vania (19 Wall., 126), which established the rule in collision 
cases that if either vessel has violated an express provision of a 
statute establishing a rule of navigation, the burden of proof is 
upon her to establish that such violation could not have contri- 
buted in any way to the disaster: The Lottawanna (21 Wall., 
558), which held that material-men furnishing supplies to a ves- 
sel in her home port acquired no lien by general maritime law 
as adopted by the United States, but that the States, until Con- 
gress acts, can authorize such liens by statutes, and that such 
statutes, although not capable of enforcement by proceedings 
in rem in the State courts, can be enforced in the United States 
District Courts: The Scotland (105 U. S., 24), which held that 
the owners of foreign vessels may obtain the benefits of the 
United States Statute limiting the liability of shipowners for 
disasters occurring on the high seas, and The Montana, a case 
which in the United States Supreme Court is reported under 
the title of the Liverpool, &V., Co. v. Phoenix Ins. Co. (129 
U. S., 397), which held that a contract of affreightment made in 
New York to ship goods by a British steamer to Liverpool, 
where the freight was to be paid in English currency, was an 
American contract, and that a stipulation exempting the com- 
pany from responsibility for the negligence of its servants was 
void under the rule established by the United States Supreme 
Court in regard to land transportation in the case of Railroad 

396 



APPENDIX 

Co. v. Lockwood, although by the law of the State of New York, 
of England, and the general maritime law existing upon the 
Continent of Europe such stipulations for exemption are valid. 
But Mr. Butler's professional labor was not at all con- 
fined to admiralty law. Several of the newspapers at the time 
of his death spoke of him as though he were exclusively an ad- 
miralty lawyer, but it is entirely erroneous to suppose that he 
was exclusively or principally devoted to that branch of the 
profession. No man at the New York bar in his time had a 
more diversified and general practice, as a reference to some o{ 
the leading cases in which he was engaged, outside of admiralty, 
will show. Juilliard v. Chaffee (92 N. Y., 529) is a leading 
authority, showing the extent to which the modern authorities 
have modified the rigor of the ancient rule that parol evidence 
is inadmissible to contradict or vary a written contract. War- 
ner v. ] affray (96 N. Y., 248) is a leading authority on the 
proposition that an assignment for the benefit of creditors, 
made by a citizen of this State, does not prevent a creditor 
residing in this State from obtaining a valid lien by attach- 
ment on the property of the assignor situated in another State, 
if the requisite steps have not been taken in such other State to 
make the assignment operative upon property situated there. 
The Fifth Avenue Bank v. Colgate (120 N. Y., 381) decided 
what proceedings were necessary for the protection of a special 
partner to extend the term of an existing special partnership, a 
question which, owing to the obscure language of the statute, 
had presented great practical difficulties to the profession be- 
fore that decision. Hyde v. King (3 Fed. Rep., 839) was a 
peculiar and intricate case in which certain fraudulent deeds, 
executed by an official assignee in bankruptcy under the Bank- 
rupt Act of 1 84 1, were set aside. Jones v. Guaranty £ff Indem- 
nity Co. (101 U. S., 622) was a case in which a large loan 
was held to have been made to a corporation, although the 

397 



APPENDIX 

bond to secure it was the individual bond of the President of the 
corporation. Hoyt v. Sprague (103 U. S., 1 13) was a case of ex- 
traordinary complexity, in which an attempt was made to hold 
the estate of a guardian for investments of his ward's property 
made many years before in the stock of a manufacturing cor- 
poration. Chief Justice Waite of the United States Supreme 
Court said that in that case Mr. Butler made the most lucid 
statement of complicated facts which he had ever heard. In 
Juilliard v. Greenman (no U. S., 421) the United States Su- 
preme Court decided that Congress had the constitutional 
power to make Treasury notes a legal tender even in time of 
peace, and not as an incident of the war power, upon which its 
previous decisions had practically based the right; a decision 
which a great many of the legal profession in this country re- 
gard as erroneous and as being shown to be erroneous by the 
masterly dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice Field. Stevenson 
v. Brooklyn Railway Co. (114 U. S., 149) was an important 
patent suit; the Liverpool, &c. y Co. v. Gunther (116 U. S., 115) 
involved difficult questions in the law of fire insurance; the 
Fourth National Bank v. Francklyn (120 U. S., 747) is a lead- 
ing case on the enforcement of stockholders' liability; the 
Union Trust Co. v. N. Y., Chicago & St. Louis Ry. Co., not 
reported, argued in the Court of Common Pleas, Cuyahoga 
County, Ohio, involved the validity of the first mortgage for 
$15,000,000 on the Nickel Plate Road. The Court decided 
against the validity of the mortgage, but the successful parties 
realized that the decision was of very doubtful validity, largely 
by reason of the very admirable argument made by Mr. But- 
ler, and a very satisfactory reorganization was effected not- 
withstanding the adverse decision. 

These cases, and others which might be cited, in which 
Mr. Butler was the leading counsel generally, involved very 
large amounts and very important legal questions, and it is at 

398 



APPENDIX 

once apparent from a consideration of the general class of 
questions involved how wide was the scope of his professional 
practice. His general rank as a lawyer was very high. As a 
consulting counsel, supervising the extensive work of a very 
large office, his advice was judicious and accurate; as an ad- 
vocate he was admirable, both in the trial of causes in courts 
of first instance and upon appeals. His legal learning was 
great. He was the master of a style of marked distinction, 
lucidity and force. A peculiarly charming feature of his ad- 
vocacy was the wit with which he almost always enlivened his 
arguments. His humor was always kindly and natural. It was 
never too prominent, but almost always, in any argument that 
he made, there were touches of bright and spontaneous humor 
here and there, which admirably illustrate his argument and 
always added a charm to it. His wit was never sarcastic and 
never wounded. He was especially courteous to young law- 
yers whom he met at the bar. Many letters were written to 
members of his family after his death, in which grateful refer- 
ences were made to this trait in his character. 

It is almost impossible to do justice to such a light and 
evanescent thing as humor in specifying instances of it, so 
much depends on the circumstances and the individuality of 
the man who is the author of it; but I venture to give a few in- 
stances of Mr. Butler's humor, well knowing how inadequate 
any such instances may be. 

He was at one time opening a case to the jury growing out 
of the failure of a merchant who had been engaged in the East 
India trade, and whose failure was caused by the fall in price 
of a large quantity of manila hemp which he had ordered. 
Mr. Butler, after stating the facts, said that this firm, like cer- 
tain other unfortunate persons, was finally suspended by too 
much hemp. 

I once heard him begin the argument of an appeal in this 

399 



APPENDIX 

way: "May it please the Court — This action was begun 
about thirty years ago; the original plaintiff" is dead, and the 
substituted plaintiff is dead ; the original defendant is dead; 
all of the counsel originally connected with the case are dead; 
and the principal question upon this appeal is whether the 
cause of action survives." 

Mr. Butler once sent a bill to an old and rather close-fisted 
merchant whose handwriting was very bad. He received a 
letter in reply which was quite undecipherable, and Mr. Butler 
asked him to call personally. He did so and apologized for 
his handwriting, saying, with a twinkle in his eye, that it 
might be hereditary, for his father and grandfather were both 
lawyers. He then began to make cautious suggestions for an 
abatement in the account, whereupon Mr. Butler interrupted 
him and said: "Now, my friend, I feel perfectly sure that if 
your father and grandfather were here, they would say that 
this bill was just right." The old gentleman, with a chuckle 
of appreciation, immediately drew his check for the whole 
amount of the bill. 

At the celebration of the Centennial Anniversary of the 
United States Supreme Court at New York, in 1890, Mr. 
Butler was selected to speak on the early organization and 
history of the Court. The arrangements for the celebration, 
it will be remembered, consisted of meetings with addresses 
during the day ending with a dinner in the evening. On the 
day of the celebration a large audience attended at the Metro- 
politan Opera House. Addresses were made by various dis- 
tinguished persons, President Cleveland, Chief Justice Fuller, 
Mr. Justice Field, Hon. Edward J. Phelps, and others, all of 
which were excellent of their kind, but the kind, it must be 
admitted, was a little ponderous and soporific. Mr. Butler 
began his address with a description of the first sitting of the 
Court, which he ended as follows: 

400 



APPENDIX 

"One interesting incident of the first session of the Supreme 
Court in this city may detain us for a moment longer. It es- 
tablished a precedent which is happily recognized and followed 
to-day. The Court accepted an invitation to dinner." As 
this was said a smile rippled over the faces of the audience, 
and every one felt that sense of relief which a bit of fun gives 
under such circumstances. The thing said was, of course, a 
trifle, but probably none of the other speakers on that occa- 
sion would have deemed it appropriate to say anything which 
would raise a smile. It was upon just such points that Mr. 
Butler's taste and tact were always so superior. 

Mr. Butler was particularly accurate in his knowledge of 
the Bible. It was very dangerous for any one in his presence 
to make a misquotation from that source. He was once 
attending a church meeting in which a project was on foot for 
raising money, and some one made a speech in which he urged 
with much insistence the example of the widow's mite in the 
Bible. When he finished Mr. Butler arose and stated that 
he regretted to be obliged to correct the preceding speaker, but 
that the Bible contained nothing about a widow's mite; a 
statement which was received with exclamations of surprise 
and incredulity by the entire audience. Mr. Butler added: 
"The widow spoken of in the Bible contributed two mites to 
the object to which her charity was directed, an example which 
should not be overlooked by those intending to make small 
contributions to this cause." 

A motion once made by Mr. Butler to have a person brought 
in as a party in a rather late stage of the proceeding, the result 
of which would be to enable him to share with others in the 
distribution of a fund, was strongly opposed, the counsel re- 
peatedly asserting that the party was applying to come in at 
the "eleventh hour." All that Mr. Butler said in reply was 
that if the Court would consult the authority referred to by his 

401 



APPENDIX 

learned opponent it would find that the man who came in at 
the eleventh hour got as much as all the rest. The motion 
was granted. 

On the trial of the "Nickel Plate" case at Cincinnati, in 
which the opposing side was trying to repudiate the first mort- 
gage, Judge Ranney, one of the opposing counsel, made a strong 
attack on the conduct of an absent officer of the road who had 
taken part in the execution of the mortgage, in the course of 
which he made what purported to be a Scriptural quotation, 
which Mr. Butler in the beginning of his argument referred to 
as follows: 

"As my distinguished and venerable friend, if I may be 
allowed so to call him, Judge Ranney, says that he may be 
called away, and as he has undertaken to support one of his 
arguments (for I assume that he would interject into this case 
nothing which he did not suppose to be relevant, in the way 
of argument), by a quotation from Scripture, I will, with your 
Honor's permission, waste a moment upon the point which he 
has thus made. What the learned counsel said in his argu- 
ment on Saturday was that he was reminded of the Scriptural 
account of an occurrence which he stated in these precise words, 
which I took down in my notes at the time: 'And when they 
were all assembled with one accord in one place, Satan came 
also among them/ The first part of the supposed citation I 
find in the copy of the authority now furnished by the counsel, 
in the New Testament — Acts, second chapter, first verse. He 
undertakes to verify that citation by going back several thous- 
and years to the Old Testament, and quoting from the Book of 
Job. That is what they call, in the vernacular of Wall Street, a 
'straddle' "! 

Judge Ranney: "You don't repudiate Job down there, 
do you ? " 

Mr. Butler: " I thank the gentleman for that word. When 
we come to the passage in Job where it said, ' Satan came,' 
we find that instead of its being where all were assembled 
with one accord, it was in a higher tribunal than any before 

402 



APPENDIX 

which we have as yet been called to appear, where Satan was 
making the air lurid with his denunciations of an honest, ab- 
sent man. He said in substance that he was a sham and a 
fraud, and if he could get hold of him, and turn him inside 
out, he would be like the proverbial cat to which the learned 
counsel likened the Nickle Plate Company, of which nothing 
is left but the tail — not even the skin — and it would be seen 
what his honesty was good for. Job did not lose his skin. 
Unfortunately for him that was the place where personally he 
was most afflicted. He sat down on an ash heap, and scraped 
himself with a potsherd; but he never repudiated. So much 
for Scripture. 



>> 



Mr. Butler's name is third on the call for the organization 
of this Association, in which he always took a deep interest. 
On various occasions he prepared memorials of deceased mem- 
bers, among them those of Mr. Nash and Mr. Tilden; that of 
Mr. Tilden particularly being one of the classics of the Me- 
morial Book. Mr. Butler was President of this Association in 
1886 and 1887, and President of the American Bar Associa- 
tion in 1886. The rules of that association require that the 
President in his annual address review the legislation of Con- 
gress and the State legislation during the preceding year. Mr. 
Butler's address on that occasion was not only admirable in 
every respect, but differed from any other ever delivered in 
that body by occasional touches of humor, which very much 
relieved the usual heavy effect almost inseparable from so dry 
a subject. 

But it was as a literary man that Mr. Butler was most widely 
known by the general public. When a very young man he 
achieved an extraordinary success in literature by the poem 
called "Nothing to Wear." 

This poem he first published anonymously. It immedi- 
ately attained great popularity in this country and in England, 
was translated into several foreign languages, and achieved 

403 



APPENDIX 

that supreme test of excellence of having its authorship claimed 
by one of those strange creatures that frequently attempt to 
obtain the credit of anonymous publications. 

"Nothing to Wear" was so well known that it was often 
jokingly referred to in Mr. Butler's presence, and whenever 
such a reference was made in the midst of any serious business, 
the effect on him was very disconcerting. He was once trying 
a case against Mr. Bourke Cockran, in which it was necessary 
to prove the value of a stock of dress goods. A witness that 
Mr. Butler was examining testified that the stock contained, 
among other things, fifty dozen fichus. "Won't you explain 
to the jury," said Mr. Butler, "what a fichu is" ? Mr. Cock- 
ran broke in and said, "That's not necessary, Mr. Butler; 
everybody knows that a fichu is an article that a lady puts on 
when she has nothing to wear." It was some time before 
Mr. Butler could bring the Court and jury back to a serious 
consideration of the case. 

In the course of his life Mr. Butler wrote a large amount 
of poetry of various kinds. An edition of his collected poems 
was published in 187 1, and another containing various addi- 
tional poems, in 1899. The last edition omits a number of 
his poems printed in the first edition, notably his poems en- 
titled "Two Millions" and "General Average," which are, 
I think, in some respects, among the best things he ever did. 

The style of his poetry is about equally divided between 
humorous and serious verse. His serious poetry is of a fairly 
high quality, but his humorous work is that upon which his 
reputation as a poet will really rest. His light society verse 
ranks very high in that class of poetry. "Nothing to Wear" 
is, I think, as clever as any verses of society written in English 
except those of Praed. He was not the equal in ludicrous 
rhymes of Barham, the author of the "Ingoldsby Legends," 
or of Hood in extraordinary punning verse, nor was he the equal 

404 



APPENDIX 

of either Lowell or Holmes in this country in purely humor- 
ous poetry, or perhaps of John G. Saxe in rhyming facility. 
But with those exceptions I think that it would be difficult 
to name any writer of his time in England or this country, 
that has excelled him in his own special line. He was pecu- 
liarly a master in the use of odd and unexpected rhymes. For 
an illustration, take these instances from "Nothing to Wear": 

"Nothing to wear! Now, as this is a true ditty, 
I do not assert — this you know, is between us — 
That she's in a state of absolute nudity, 
Like Powers' Greek Slave or the Medici Venus." 

"Well, I felt for the lady, and felt for my hat, too, 
Improvised on the crown of the latter a tattoo." 

• ••••••• 

"I should mention just here, that out of Miss Flora's 
Two hundred and fifty or sixty adorers, 
I had just been selected as he who should throw all 
The rest in the shade, by the gracious bestowal 
On myself, after twenty or thirty rejections, 
Of those fossil remains which she called her 'affections,' 
And that rather decayed, but well-known work of art, 
Which Miss Flora persisted in styling her 'heart.' 
So we were engaged. Our troth had been plighted, 
Not by moonbeam or starbeam, by fountain or grove, 
But in a front parlor, most brilliantly lighted, 
Beneath the gas-fixtures, we whispered our love. 
Without any romance, or raptures or sighs, 
Without any tears in Miss Flora's blue eyes, 
Or blushes, or transports, or such silly actions, 
It was one of the quietest business transactions, 
With a very small sprinkling of sentiment, if any, 
And a very large diamond imported by Tiffany." 



405 



APPENDIX 

A short time ago some newspaper writer asserted that no 
rhyme could be made on the name of Tiffany and a corre- 
spondent in the Times replied, citing this passage. 

The following description of the famous Sexton of Grace 
Church, from his poem, "The Sexton and the Thermometer," 
illustrates the same cleverness in rhyming: 

"No mere undertaker was he, or to make 
The statement more clear, for veracity's sake, 
There was nothing at all he did not undertake; 
Discharging at once such a complex variety 
Of functions pertaining to genteel society, 
As gave him with everyone great notoriety; 
Blending his care of the church and the cloisters 
With funerals, fancy balls, suppers, and oysters, 
Dinners for aldermen, parties for brides, 
And a hundred and fifty arrangements besides; 
Great as he was at a funeral, greater 
As master of feasts, purveyor, gustator, 
Little less than the host, but far more than the waiter." 

Mr. Butler's easy mastery of humorous verse is well illus- 
trated in his poem called "Dobbs His Ferry, ,, a poem directed 
against the silly craze which existed at one time for changing 
the good old names of places on the Hudson River. In that 
poem he has a dream in which he meets the original Dobbs. 

"I turned, and there the craft was, 
Its shape 'twixt scow and raft was, 
Square ends, low sides, and flat; 
And, standing close beside me, 
An ancient chap who eyed me, 

Beneath a steeple hat; 
Short legs — long-pipe — style very 
Pre-Revolutionary — ■ 
406 



APPENDIX 

I bow, he grimly bobs; 
Then, with some perturbation, 
By way of salutation, 

Says I, 'How are you, Dobbs ?' " 

Dobbs thereupon frees his mind about the new names of 
places, as follows: 

"That's it, they're not partic'lar, 
Respecting the auric'lar, 
At a stiff market rate; 
But Dobbs' especial vice is, 
That he keeps down the prices 

Of all their real estate! 
A name so unattractive 
Makes villa-sites inactive, 

And spoils the broker's jobs; 
They think that speculation 
Would rage at 'Paulding's Station,' 
Which stagnates now at 'Dobbs.' " 
• 

"Down there, on old Manhattan, 
Where land-sharks breed and fatten, 

They've wiped out Tubby Hook. 
That famous promontory, 
Renowned in song and story, 

Which time nor tempest shook, 
Whose name for aye had been good, 
Stands newly christened 'Inwood,' 

And branded with the shame 
Of some old rogue who passes 
By dint of aliases, 
Afraid of his own name! 

"See how they quite outrival, 
Plain barn-yard Spuyten-Duyvil, 

407 



APPENDIX 

"By peacock Riverdale, 
Which thinks all else it conquers, 
And over homespun Yonkers 

Spreads out its flaunting tail! 
There's new-named Mount St. Vincent, 
Where each dear little inn'cent 

Is taught the Popish rites; 
Well, ain't it queer, wherever 
These saints possess the river 

They get the finest sites!" 

Mr. Butler very often wrote verses on occasions of reunions 
and birthday celebrations in his family. Those written for 
the children were very bright and gay, and those written for 
meetings of older members of the family were singularly grace- 
ful. One of the children's poems, entitled "Somebody," con- 
tains the following verses, a good illustration of his style: 

"SOMEBODY" 

There's a meddlesome "Somebody" going about, 
And playing his pranks, but we can't find him out; 
He's up-stairs and down-stairs from morning till night, 
And always in mischief, but never in sight. 

The rogues I have read of in song or in tale 
Are caught at the end, and conducted to jail; 
But "Somebody's" tracks are all covered so well 
He never has seen the inside of a cell. 

Our young folks at home at all seasons and times 
Are rehearsing the roll of "Somebody's" crimes; 
Or fast as their feet and their tongues can well run, 
Come to tell the last deed the sly scamp has done. 

" 'Somebody' has taken my knife," one will say; 
" 'Somebody' has carried my pencil away"; 

408 



APPENDIX 

'Somebody' has gone and thrown down all the blocks"; 
" 'Somebody' ate up all the cakes in the box." ' 

I do not certainly know who the somebody is who is 
referred to in this poem, but I have a suspicion that the ex- 
traordinary activity and energy in childhood of the somebody 
there described was the source, in maturer years, of that ex- 
cellent book for which our profession is so much indebted to 
one of the members of this Association, on "The Treaty-Mak- 
ing Power of the United States." 

As an illustration of the grace and charm of Mr. Butler's 
graver poems on family occasions, let me quote a verse from 
"A Golden Wedding," a poem read at the fiftieth anniversary 
of the marriage of his uncle, Mr. Charles Butler: 

"Only once in fifty years 
The Golden Wedding day appears; 
Like a guest from far-off lands, 
Knocking at the door he stands. 

1 The additional verses to this poem are here given. — Ed. 

It is "Somebody" breaks all the pitchers and plates, 
And hides the boys' sleds and runs off with their skates, 
And turns on the water and tumbles the beds, 
And steals all the pins and melts all the dolls' heads. 

One night a dull sound, like the thump of a head, 
Announced that one youngster was out of his bed; 
And he said, half asleep, when asked what it meant, 
" 'Somebody' is pushing me out of the tent!" 

Now, if these high crimes of "Somebody" don't cease, 
We must summon in the detective police; 
And they, in their wisdom, at once will make known 
The culprit belongs to no house but our own. 

And should it turn out after all to be true 
That our young folks themselves are "Somebody," too, 
How queer it would look if we saw them all go, 
Marched off to the station-house, six in a row! 

409 



APPENDIX 

Ah! how few the happy homes 
Where his tardy footstep comes; 
Ah! how few can watch and wait 
For a guest who comes so late. 
Tears are on his wrinkled cheek — 
Some are gone he fain would seek; 
Smiles are on his happy face — 
All the living to embrace; 
Give him welcome, warm and bright, 
For he tarries but a night, 
With glad songs and garlands gay, 
Hail the Golden Wedding day." 

"Golden in the hopes whose light 
Makes life's evening calm and bright; 
Here are home's endearing charms, 
Love's encircling, sheltering arms; 
All that best old age attends — 
'Honor, love and troops of friends,' 
Yet the brightest prospect lies 
Past the bound of earthly skies; 
Home still fairer, love more fond, 
Blessings here and bliss beyond!" 

Twenty-five years after this, in 1900, Mr. and Mrs. Butler 
celebrated their own golden wedding, on which occasion Mr. 
Butler wrote a poem entitled "Pactolus," likening the bless- 
ings they had received to the golden river of Crcesus, but giv- 
ing its source " in the blessing of the Lord." 

Many of his references to the profession of the law in his 
humorous verse are very apposite and clever. 

One of the best definitions of General Average which I 
know of is contained in his poem with that title: 

"Thus, circled with perils, ship, cargo and freight, 
Involved in one common adventure and fate. 

4IO 



APPENDIX 

Where disaster befalls, 'tis equal and fair 

That all the full burden of rescue should bear, 

Each paying its just and proportionate share, 

Which joint contribution, on this equal scale, 

Is called 'General Average,' whence hangs our tale." 

In his poem of "Two Millions" there is a description of a 
man of great wealth who is found in a fit and is supposed to 
be dead. He held convulsively clutched in each hand por- 
tions of his will, which he had torn in two. The question 
immediately arose whether he had annulled his will by inten- 
tionally destroying it, or it had been unintentionally torn by 
an involuntary convulsive action when he was seized with the 
attack. A lawyer is consulted. 

"Straight on the lawyer's clear, prophetic sight, 
The Firkin Will Case rises into light, 
Latest and greatest of the famous causes, 
About last wills, their codicils and clauses. 
He sees the eager birds of prey who wait, 
Around the carcass of the huge estate, 
In the dim chambers of the Surrogate; 
Three bulky quartos stuffed with the proceedings, 
Ten leading lawyers crammed with special pleadings; 
A hundred witnesses on either side, 
With cross-examinations scarified; 
And twenty doctors, portly and persistent, 
With twenty theories, all inconsistent! 
But, fairest sight of all, besides, he sees 
A princely revenue of costs and fees, 
No risk of loss, no client to be dunned, 
All the expenses charged upon the Fund!" 

Mr. Butler's prose works were quite inconsiderable in 
comparison with his poetry. He wrote a bright little story, 

411 



APPENDIX 

full of wit, entitled "Mrs. Limber's Raffle," showing that an 
ordinary church raffle is a clear violation of the laws of this 
State. He also wrote a novel called "Domesticus." This 
book contains many bright passages, but upon the whole was 
not very successful. The plot partly hinges on the difficulties 
of domestic service in this country, a subject which, it must be 
admitted, in this book, as in ladies' conversations, is sometimes 
deficient in interest. Several of his public addresses have 
been published. One of them on "The Relations Between 
Lawyer and Client" is a most admirable statement of the 
rules of professional ethics growing out of that relation. An- 
other on "The Bible By Itself" is an earnest appeal for the 
more thorough and general study of the Bible. 

Mr. Butler had an extraordinary memory, not only for 
facts, but for the exact language of long passages in poetry 
or prose. On one occasion he wrote out a funeral sermon 
which he had heard so accurately that the clergyman who de- 
livered it, and to whom it was submitted for revision, stated 
that he had no corrections or alterations to suggest. 

When Mr. Butler was a young man he once attended one 
of Mr. Samuel Rogers' famous literary breakfasts in London. 
Mr. George Bancroft, the historian, who was all his life an 
intimate friend of Mr. Butler, was present. At that break- 
fast Mr. Rogers recited to his guests an unpublished poem. 
After leaving, Mr. Butler accompanied Mr. Bancroft to his 
home, and after arriving there, Mr. Bancroft expressed a wish 
that he had a copy of the verses which they had just heard. 
"Then take your pencil," said Mr. Butler, and he thereupon 
dictated to Mr. Bancroft the entire poem correctly. 

Nearly fifty years later, at a dinner at Mr. Bancroft's house 
in Washington, at which Mr. Butler was present, Mr. Bancroft 
told this story as affording a remarkable exhibition of the 
power of memory, and, turning to Mr. Butler, asked him if he 

412 



APPENDIX 

remembered the incident. Mr. Butler replied, "Yes, I re- 
member the incident and I remember the poem, too," and he 
thereupon proceeded to recite the entire poem again. 

His marvelous memory remained unimpaired to the end of 
his life. The last poem which he wrote was in April, 1902, 
on the fiftieth anniversary of the church in Yonkers, of which 
for many years he was a member. When he composed this 
poem he had become substantially blind. It contains one 
hundred and thirty-three lines. It was written down from his 
dictation, and, when finished, was read over to him a few 
times, and he delivered it himself at the church meeting, en- 
tirely from memory, without the slightest break or hesita- 
tion, never having seen, and being entirely unable to see, the 
words. 

Of Mr. Butler as a man and citizen, it would be difficult 
to speak too highly. In the year 1865 he removed to Yonkers, 
where he always afterwards resided. He took a deep interest 
in all good causes in Yonkers, and was for many years recog- 
nized as the leading citizen of the place. He made addresses 
on almost all important public occasions in Yonkers, and his 
speeches were always of marked distinction and elevation of 
tone. Among the most notable were those delivered at the 
opening of the Music Hall and at the opening of the Woman's 
Institute, in which institution Mr. Butler was very deeply in- 
terested and to which he made large gifts of money. 

Mr. Butler was a man of the widest and deepest sym- 
pathy with suffering and wretchedness of every kind. He was 
especially impressed by the misery of the very poor in the 
great cities. Nearly fifty years before the recent tenement 
legislation in this State was adopted some of the noblest pas- 
sages in Mr. Butler's poetry denounced the New York tene- 
ment house. Many of you will remember the splendid pas- 
sage near the end of "Nothing to Wear." 

413 



APPENDIX 

"O ladies, dear ladies, the next sunny day 
Please trundle your hoops just out of Broadway, 
From its whirl and its bustle, its fashion and pride, 
And the temples of Trade which tower on each side, 
To the alleys and lanes, where Misfortune and Guilt 
Their children have gathered, their city have built; 
Where Hunger and Vice, like twin beasts of prey, 
Have hunted their victims to gloom and despair; 
Raise the rich, dainty dress, and the fine broidered skirt, 
Pick your delicate way through the dampness and dirt, 
Grope through the dark dens, climb the rickety stair 
To the garret, where wretches, the young and the old, 
Half starved and half naked, lie crouched from the cold; 
See those skeleton limbs, those frost-bitten feet, 
All bleeding and bruised by the stones of the street; 
Hear the sharp cry of childhood, the deep groans that swell 
From the poor dying creature who writhes on the floor; 
Hear the curses that sound like the echoes of Hell, 
As you sicken and shudder and fly from the door; 
Then home to your wardrobes, and say, if you dare — ■ 
Spoiled children of fashion — you've nothing to wear!" 

Equally noble are the lines on the same theme from "Two 
Millions," written in 1858. 

"The Tenement House, o'er which, with friendly hand, 
Modern Improvement waves no magic wand, 
With half-cracked walls and windows all askew, 
Stamped with the blight of beggary through and through, 
Lintel and door-post sprinkled with its sign, 
House after house extends the dismal line! 
A dreary sight to philanthropic eyes, 
Between the gutter and the distant skies, 
By filth and noisome odors marked and tracked, 
Through the dense districts where the poor are packed, 
Crowded and swarming in those wretched hives, 

414 



APPENDIX 

Layer on layer of cheap human lives! 

Or, if you think the picture overdone, 

Go for yourself, if you have never gone; 

Go in midwinter, when the drifting sleet 

Through the bare hall pursues your freezing feet, 

And, as from room to room you hurry past, 

The crazy building rattling in the blast, 

At doors ajar gaunt faces peep and glare, 

In hopes some friendly step may linger there. 

Go in midsummer, when the August rays 

Pour on the place their fierce, untempered blaze: 

From the scorched pavement to the sun-struck eaves, 

No point of shade the flaming mass relieves; 

And the hot air, with rank and poisoned breath, 

Through doors and windows puffs disease and death." 

This feeling of the need of reform in tenement house con- 
struction never left him. 

In the last poem he ever wrote, in 1902, in answering the 
question, "What Needs the Church To-Day?" he states, 
among other things, that it should 

"Share the toil where civic virtue strives 
For better laws and homes and nobler lives." 

Mr. Butler was a Republican in politics all his life, and 
at almost every presidential election he made a speech in 
Yonkers on the political issues of the election. These speeches 
were usually published. They were characterized by a distinc- 
tion of style and a nobility of thought which gave them rank 
among the finest political addresses of his time. He never 
filled any political or judicial office, and it is a subject of sincere 
regret that a man so highly qualified to render valuable ser- 
vices in such capacities should have been left, through a long 
life in this State, without being called into the public service. 

415 



APPENDIX 

It is natural, in the memorials of members of this Associa- 
tion, to err on the side of eulogy. But Mr. Butler's life and 
character were so praiseworthy that it is difficult to speak of 
them with due reserve. He was a perfect gentleman. His 
clear-cut, intellectual face, like a Greek cameo, and his whole 
bearing, always gave the impression both of power and of 
distinction. He was a man of wide cultivation, and of taste 
for all graceful and beautiful things. He had an unusually 
affectionate and domestic nature. He was very fond of his 
family, his relations, his friends, his home, his books. Even 
the bitter trial which befell him in the last few years of his 
life, in the loss of his eyesight, did not affect the unvarying 
serenity, and sweetness of his character. He had, without 
ostentation, a deeply reverent and devotional nature. This 
is particularly shown in his serious poetry which is almost 
always tinged with a deep religious feeling. In short, in all 
the relations of life, he was a man entitled to the highest 
admiration. 

In estimating his actual rank as a lawyer and as a literary 
man, it may probably he admitted that there were a few law- 
yers of his time of greater eminence, and a few literary men 
of his time of greater reputation, but I think it is an entirely 
accurate statement to assert that no man of his time, either in 
England or America, held an equally high rank, both as a 
lawyer and a literary man. 



416 



MEMORIAL PROCEEDINGS IN THE 
SUPREME COURT 

At a session of the Supreme Court, Appellate Division, 
First Department, held in the Court House in the County of 
New York, on Wednesday, October 22, 1902, there being 
present Justices Van Brunt, Patterson, Ingraham, Hatch and 
Laughlin, the following memorial was presented and read be- 
fore the Court by Mr. John E. Parsons: 

William Allen Butler, the son of Benjamin Franklin 
Butler, was born at Albany, on February 20th, 1825, and died 
at Yonkers on September 9th, 1902. He was admitted to the 
bar in 1846, and his active professional career, if it should be 
considered as having terminated before his death, covered a 
period considerably longer than half a century. 

Mr. Butler began the practice of the law with the ad- 
vantage and the peril of a professional association with a 
great Lawyer — his father, whose name and fame as a lawyer 
and as an advocate, still are and long will be remembered. 
If such a reputation is inheritable, it is a burden or a benefit 
to the heir, according to his capacity to administer the suc- 
cession. Mr. Butler's career at this Bar may be summed up by 
the statement that his death left it undiminished. 

Such a memorial as this has for its purpose a record of 
character, and a tribute of respect, and not a narrative of in- 
cidents. Mr. Butler's life, indeed, is conspicuous, not for 
striking events, but for a steady and continuous labor in an 
absorbing profession, and an equally steady and continuous 
flow of consequent reputation and prosperity. The grace- 

417 



APPENDIX 

ful style, the poetic fancy, and the brilliant wit which were 
among his native gifts, and which were effective professional 
weapons in his hands, certainly served him also for his own 
pleasure and that of others in moments of diversion; but by 
those who have known him at the Bar it will unhesitatingly 
be acknowledged that his life work did not differ in character, 
if it did in the degree of prosperity and reputation by which 
it was deservedly rewarded, from that of any successful law- 
yer, charged with the responsibility of affairs of great impor- 
tance and constantly absorbed in the exacting labor of adviser 
and advocate. 

A reference to a few of the important cases in which Mr. 
Butler was engaged will serve as evidence of his rank in the 
profession. 

In the case of The Steamer Pennsylvania (19 Wall, 126) 
Mr. Butler was successful in obtaining a reversal by the Su- 
preme Court of the United States of the decrees both of the 
Circuit and District Courts, which had followed decisions of 
the English Admiralty Court, and of the Privy Council. This 
decision conclusively settled the doctrine in collision cases, 
that a vessel violating a rule of navigation laid down by Statute, 
must prove affirmatively that such violation could not have 
contributed to the disaster. The decision has been repeatedly 
cited and followed, and has been of immense value in induc- 
ing compliance with the provisions of the Statutes. 

In The Scotland (105 U. S., 24), where Mr. Butler was 
again successful in spite of adverse decisions below, the Su- 
preme Court of the United States established the rule that 
owners of foreign Vessels may obtain the benefit of our Stat- 
utes for the limitation of liability of owners of Vessels for 
disasters on the high seas. 

In Sturgis v. Spofford (45 N. Y., 446) Mr. Butler success- 
fully maintained the constitutionality of the Law of 1853, 

418 



APPENDIX 

establishing the Board of Commissioners of Pilots; and in Peo- 
ple v. Vanderbilt (26 N. Y., 286) he obtained an assertion of 
the power of that board to prevent encroachments upon the 
public piers and in the Harbor of New York. 

Other important cases argued by Mr. Butler were Union 
Trust Co. v. New York, Chicago & St. Louis R.R., involving 
the validity of the bonds and mortgage of the defendant com- 
pany; Rich v. New York Central R. R. (87 N. Y., 383), and 
(154 N. Y., 733), involving novel questions as to liability for 
tort arising from non-performance of contract; The Chicago 
Gas Trust Reorganization case, where the legality of the plan 
of reorganization was sustained against the opinion of a 
majority of leading Lawyers of Chicago; Fifth Avenue Bank 
vs. Colgate (120 N. Y., 381), involving novel questions affecting 
liability under the Special Partnership Act; Stevenson v. 
Brooklyn R. R. (114 U. S., 149), a case on patent Law; Liver- 
pool & London & Globe Insurance Co. v. Gunther (116 
U. S., 115), involving interesting questions in the Law of Fire 
Insurance; the Legal Tender case of Juillard v. Greeman (no 
U. S., 421), and the famous case of Hoyt v. Sprague (103 U. 
S., 613), involving intricate questions of partnership Law. 

A just appreciation of Mr. Butler's thorough and general 
attainments in our many-sided science precludes, however, the 
ascription to him of superior attainments in any one of its 
branches. In the law of admiralty, of insurance, of real es- 
tate, of wills and testamentary trusts, of corporations and 
banking, as in other branches which are sometimes considered 
specialties, he was a master, but he had too many specialties to 
be considered a specialist. 

So again Mr. Butler was too sound and sagacious an ad- 
viser in his office, too brilliant and successful an advocate in 
the Courts to be permitted to devote himself exclusively to 
one or the other of the two main divisions of the profession. 

419 



APPENDIX 

Perhaps the most effective work, however, was as an advocate 
and especially in the Appellate Courts, where his deep knowl- 
edge of the law, his phenomenal memory, his remarkable 
powers of elucidation and illustration of legal principles, and 
his temperate and almost judicial attitude of mind, were most 
effectively brought into play. 

But such talents as these, though always compelling ad- 
miration, would not alone command the grateful respect 
which it is sought here to record. It is a conspicuous pattern 
of the noble qualities of professional character that he should 
be described and remembered. That his integrity was spot- 
less, his veracity undeviating, is hardly to be remarked; but 
it is remarkable that in him they appeared to be spontaneous 
and instinctive, to be of the inward essence of the man. 
Among the fruits of these fundamental qualities were candor 
and fairness in the statement both of facts and principles, 
courtesy and generosity to his adversaries, and his reward, 
in the confidence and affection of Bench and Bar, was as 
ample as deserved. 

The rank accorded to Mr. Butler by his professional 
brethren is evidenced by his having served as President of the 
American Bar Association in 1885-1886, and as President of 
the Association of the Bar of the City of New York in the years 
1887 and 1888. 

No complete view of Mr. Butler could be made without a 
reference to his character as a man and a Citizen. Evidence 
on these matters can best be found in the community in which 
a man has dwelt. For the last thirty-seven years of his life 
Mr. Butler was a resident of Yonkers. All the best elements 
in the development of this Village, Town and City, in which 
he lived and whose growth he watched, were of keen interest 
to Mr. Butler and were generously fostered by him. As a de- 
voted member of one of its largest churches, as the chief founder 

420 






APPENDIX 

of a free reading room, which until other instrumentalities 
superseded it, was of great benefit to the poorer classes; as a 
large contributor in work and money to the building up of 
the Woman's Institute for the benefit of working women, one 
of the most successful Institutions of the City, as the wise 
adviser of one of its hospitals, and in many other ways, Mr. 
Butler showed his public spirit. While taking no prominent 
part in party management, he never failed on occasion to coun- 
sel his fellow-citizens upon public questions on the plat- 
form and through the press, and no opinions were listened to 
with more respect or carried greater weight. His views in 
council were sought upon a great variety of subjects affect- 
ing the common welfare, and his influence, founded upon the 
confidence of the community in his high character, public 
spirit, fair and sound judgment, has for a generation been 
widely felt. 

Nor was Mr. Butler's public spirit and usefulness unfelt 
in the city of New York, where he was constantly connected 
with important philanthropic work. He was, for instance, an 
active member for many years, of the Board of Trustees of the 
Lenox Library, and, after its consolidation with the Astor 
and Tilden Libraries, and until his death, of the Board of 
Trustees of the New York Public Library. 

Mr. Butler's life, and that of his distinguished father, 
cover a period which connects the present with the far differ- 
ent kind of professional life and work in the early years of 
the past century. During the many years which he devoted 
to his profession he was a marked figure. It is no disparage- 
ment of others to say that from the beginning his position was 
in the very front rank. Following upon the renown which by 
his name he inherited, his position might in a special sense 
be described as unique. The members of his profession have 
thought that in his case it was exceptionally suitable that there 

4 2I 



APPENDIX 

should be inscribed upon the records of the Court some refer- 
ence to his career, and the due expressions of regret, when at 
last, full of years and honor, he passed away. 

At the conclusion of Mr. John E. Parsons's reading of the 
memorial, Presiding Justice Van Brunt addressed the Bar as 
follows: 

It was with great regret that we learned last summer of the 
death of Mr. Butler. He was one of the few remaining links 
which connect the past with the present and the old with the 
new. He commenced his study of the law at a time when its 
practice required some accuracy and precision. He served his 
novitiate at a time when the counsel filing his declaration was 
compelled to know whether he desired to recover upon a 
promissory note or for conversion. The analysis which the 
counsel was then required to make of the case which was 
presented before him stood Mr. Butler in good stead during 
the whole of his career. There was one feature in his presen- 
tation of his cases to the Court which always struck me as 
being exceedingly remarkable, and I know of none that ex- 
celled him in that regard and few that equalled him. He 
evidently had prepared his cases with great care, had studied 
them in all the lights to which they were subject, and he was 
enabled to state all the facts of the case clearly, accurately and 
with precision, being careful not to leave out those which 
might tend against the view which he desired to enforce upon 
the Court. So that when he had gotten through with his 
statement of the case the Court might feel confident that they 
were possessed of all the facts which were necessary to apply 
the principles which he would then seek to lay before the 
Court. I regret to say that our experience of today shows 
that his example has been rarely followed in that particular. 

422 



APPENDIX 

And I have often thought that probably the reasons why he 
was so happy in that regard, arose from the fact of his early 
education, at a time, as I have already said, when some pre- 
cision and accuracy were required on the part of the counsel 
in respect to the features of the case upon which he expected 
to succeed. 

The memorial expresses very aptly and happily the position 
which Mr. Butler occupied at the Bar; and all its suggestions 
are fully concurred in by the Court. They think it is eminently 
proper that the memorial should be spread upon the minutes 
of the Court as a tribute to the memory of Mr. Butler, and they 
make that direction. The memorial will accordingly be in- 
scribed upon the minutes of the Court with a memorandum of 
the proceedings of this meeting. 



423 



MEMORIAL PROCEEDINGS IN THE DISTRICT 
COURT OF THE UNITED STATES 

At a session of the District Court of the United States for 
the Southern District of New York, held on October 28, 1902, 
in the court rooms in the City of New York, Mr. Robert D. 
Benedict addressed the Court as follows: 

May it please the Court. 

A memorial of William Allen Butler, recently deceased, was 
presented to the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of 
this Department on the twenty-second instant on behalf of 
the Bar and was ordered by that Court to be recorded in its 

minutes. 

It has been thought appropriate that in view of the emi- 
nence of Mr. Butler in Admiralty a memorial should be pre- 
sented to the Admiralty Court also which should speak of him 
as an Admiralty lawyer. 

And on behalf of the Admiralty Bar the Court is now re- 
quested to receive the following Memorial and to order that it 
may be placed upon the files of the Court and recorded in its 
minutes. 

MEMORIAL 

On September 9, 1902, died William Allen Butler, who was 
admitted to the Bar of this Court on January 5, 1848. For a 
large part of the fifty years of his membership of the Bar of 
this Court he was active in the Admiralty practice, and he 
took part in many of the important cases which have come 
before our Admiralty Courts. It would take too long to give 

424 



APPENDIX 

details of even the more important of these cases. But two 
cases may well be mentioned, from which Mr. Butler obtained 
the fame which belongs to successful counsel in cases of great 
national importance. 

One was the case of the steamer Pennsylvania, in which 
Mr. Butler obtained from the Supreme Court of the United 
States a reversal, not only of the decree of both the Circuit 
and District Courts, but also of the English Admiralty Court 
and Privy Council, whose decisions had been followed by our 
lower courts. The decision in that case established upon an 
immovable foundation the doctrine in reference to collision of 
vessels, that, as to matters which are governed by statute, if 
either vessel which has been in collision has violated such 
express provision, the burden is upon her to establish that 
such violation could not have in any way contributed to the 
disaster, a decision of immense importance in ensuring com- 
pliance by navigators with the provisions of that statute. 

The other case was the case of The Scotland, in which 
Mr. Butler won again the success in the United States Su- 
preme Court of reversing the decisions of the two lower courts. 
That case established the rule that the owners of foreign ves- 
sels may obtain the benefits of the limitations of liability, 
created by the statutes of this country, in reference to disas- 
ters occurring to their vessels on the high seas, a decision 
whose far-reaching extent can hardly be exaggerated. 

It may be added, to show the importance of these two de- 
cisions, that the case of the Pennsylvania has been cited more 
than seventy times, and the case of the Scotland more than 
eighty times, by the courts, in their decisions involving similar 
questions. 

Mr. Butler's knowledge of the Admiralty law and its prin- 
ciples was large. Nor was it confined to the questions which 
more frequently arise. He extended his researches into less 

425 



APPENDIX 

familiar regions of the law. His poem on General Average 
shows not only his research but also his quick sense of the 
humorous elements which may be found here and there, even 
in the consideration of legal matters. 

It was not, however, to such nugae canorae that Mr. Butler 
attributed importance. He said once to a friend, when his 
poem of "Nothing to Wear" had been mentioned, "Is it not 
pitiful that such a trivial thing as that should be more widely 
known, and give to its author a more extended reputation, 
ofttimes, than he receives from works to which he has given 
the full exercise of his best powers ?" 

Nor will we dwell upon such light trifles. His clear per- 
ception of principles, his acute and powerful reasoning, and, 
above all, his fairness and courtesy as an advocate, will always 
entitle him to a high place among the great lawyers of the 
Admiralty, and to the pleasantest of memories among his 
fellows of the Admiralty Bar. 

The passing away of one so prominent for so long a time 
should be noted, and an expression given to our feelings of re- 
spect for him and regret for our loss. We therefore request 
the Court to order this brief notice, all too unsatisfactory though 
it be, to be filed in the Records, and entered upon the Minutes 
of the Court. 



426 



ADDRESS IN THE COURT OF APPEALS 

On the presentation of the portrait of William Allen Butler 
at Albany, New York, March 20, 191 1, the following address 
was made by Alton B. Parker, formerly the Chief Judge of the 
Court: 

If the Court please to permit it, I will appropriate a few min- 
utes before the calendar is taken up, trusting that my subject 
will insure to my words a patient hearing and to me pardon for 
the theft of time. 

It is my honor and pleasure to present, on behalf of Mrs. 
William Allen Butler, to the Court, a portrait of her husband, 
the late William Allen Butler, painted by his son, Howard Rus- 
sell Butler. Skill and love have wrought so wonderfully well 
that from this canvas William Allen Butler his very self seems 
to look out upon us with the old dignity and kindliness. The 
portrait is indeed faithfully true to the original. "The end has 
crowned the work; the high endeavor and the long toil, with full 
success are blest." 

William Allen Butler was born in this city, February 20, 
1825. The career of his father, Benjamin F. Butler, distin- 
guished lawyer and statesman, carried the son during his boy- 
hood to Washington and later to New York, where he was edu- 
cated at the University of the City of New York, studied law in 
his father's office and came to the Bar in 1846. From that year 
until his death, fifty-six years later, he was continuously en- 
gaged in the city of New York. 

Much of his professional work was Admiralty practice, but 
his large general practice brought him as an advocate constantly 

427 



APPENDIX 

before the other Federal and State Courts, and many leading 
cases in this Court and the United States Supreme Court were 
briefed and argued by him. Argument and advice from him 
were ever authoritative and clarifying. He was loyal always to 
his clients, fair to his opponents, profound in his reverence for 
legal tribunals and decisions, and exceptionally courteous to 
the striplings of the bar. 

Turning from the professional to the more personal side of 
the man, we find him cultured, fond of refined society, travel, 
books and art, cordially sympathetic with poverty and suffering, 
keenly fond and appreciative of childhood. We know him as 
a husband and father who loved his home and family before 
all things, as a poet whose rhythmic periods cling to the memory 
and whose graceful humor is an inexhaustible pleasure, as a citi- 
zen who was at once an enthusiastic partisan and a good patriot. 

In other lands such culture, ability and good citizenship 
would have been emphasized by the royal gift of a title. In 
this country, where every man is a prince of the blood royal, 
sovereign people have conferred upon William Allen Butler 
that fond regard and respect reserved for the few — the aristo- 
crats of our regal Republic, men of pre-eminent talent, lofty 
character, pure ideals, fearless truth and unselfish life. "And 
with theirs his loved name shall be honored and sung." 

On September 9, 1902, William Allen Butler crossed the 
bar and dropped anchor in the shimmer of the harbor lights of 
the City of Promise. 

"Where all is made right which so puzzles us here, 
Where the glare and the glitter and tinsel of Time 
Fade and die in the light of that region sublime, 
Where the soul, disenchanted of flesh and of sense, 
Unscreened by its trappings and shows and pretense, 
Must be clothed for the life and the service above, 
With purity, truth, faith, meekness and love." 

428 



APPENDIX 

There hang now in this chamber and the entrance corridor 
portraits of jurists and members of the Bar representing the 
long line from the day of Jay, Kent and Van Vechten to ours, 
whose names are so familiar of the legal page, but whose faces, 
except the few that live in our memories are known to us only 
because their portraits adorn these walls. It is fitting that 
William Allen Butler should be added to these Judges and advo- 
cates of old time by whom we are surrounded from the moment 
we cross the outer threshold. 

"A silent multitude — and thus 
No message comes from them to us, 
Yet, like a tuneful requiem, 
A greeting goes from us to them." 

Chief Judge Cullen, in accepting the portrait on behalf of 
the Court, responded to Judge Parker as follows: 

" It is with great pleasure that the Court receives the portrait 
now presented to it. William Allen Butler, whose likeness is 
now before us, was a gentleman of great culture and refinement, 
a ripe scholar, and possessed of literary ability of a high order, 
but it is his standing as a great lawyer and advocate that rend- 
ers it appropriate that his portrait should hang on the walls of 
the entrance to this Court room, so that members of the pro- 
fession of coming generations may see how the man, whose dis- 
tinction and learning they will know only either historically or 
by tradition, appeared in the flesh, and may be aroused to emu- 
late his character and achievements. 

"Now, unfortunately, our space is circumscribed, but we 
hope the time will come when this Court will have an abode of 
its own of such a size as to gather in its halls the portraits of 
all the great men of this State who have honored our profession. 

"Judge Parker will please return to the family of Mr. But- 
ler our thanks for its gift." 

429 



INDEX 



Abolition, societies, 68; of slave-trade, 74; 
growth of sentiment in North, 78; effect 
in South, 78; Forsyth's letter, 78, 79; 
Garrison and The Liberator, 80; effect 
of sale of slave wife, 82, 83; abolition- 
ists denounced by Webster, 223, 226; 
attitude of abolitionists on Fugitive 
Slave Law, 240; on Kansas-Nebraska 
Bill, 255; aid for John Brown, 331. 

Adams, Charles Francis, 190. 

Adams, John Quincy, attitude on slaver} - , 
54; on Missouri Compromise, 77. 

Adams, Rev. William, 319. 

Adelsberg Cave, 140. 

Admiralty, resolution of Bar, 424. 

Aetna, Mount, 164. 

Ainsworth, Captain, of packet-ship Havre, 

15 1 , 1 5 2 - 

Alabama, The, 354. 

Albany, N. Y., William Allen Butler born 
at, 7; Yonker Street, 7; friends at, 
21; Dr. Sprague, 27; Congress Hall 
Hotel, 29; Benjamin Franklin Butler 
leaves, ^y, letter from citizens, 44. 

Albany Academy, 29. 

"Albany Regency," 37, 38. 

Alexander de Alva S., political history of 
New York, 38. 

Allen, Howard, 9. 

Allen, Harriet (Butler). See Butler, Harriet 
Allen (William Allen Butler's mother). 

Allen, Lydia, 9. 

Allen, Mary (Macy), 62. 

Allen, William Henry, 10. 

Allen, William Howard, William Allen 
Butler named for, 9; family and home, 
9; career in navy, 10-13; death and 
memorials, 13-15; Halleck's poem, 14; 
William Allen Butler's address on, 15; 
friend of Captain Levy, 317. 

American Art Union, 236-239. 



American Bar Association, 403, 420. 

Anderson, Major Robert, 342, 347. 

Anecdotes: Confederate veteran and 
son, 5; saddle-horse Diamond, 8; the 
shad in the spring, 19; Delavan suit 
and controversy, 23-25; petition to 
hang Dr. Sprague, 27; E. E. Sprague, 
name and initials, 28; Benjamin Frank- 
lin's saw-dust pudding, 46-48; entry of 
Supreme Court Justices, 49; William 
Wirt's hair, 52; Lafayette's wig, 63; 
John Smothers, the slave employee, Si; 
sale of slave wife, 82; "Boz," 93; The 
Wellcr "V," 100; loquacious fello-. - 
passenger, 119; told by Andrew Jack- 
son, 123; his call on Mrs. Clay, 125; 
Frelinghuysen a "bird," 141; shooting 
an ibis, 157 ; The Queen's English, 158; 
Pompeian Hotel notice, 162; passports 
in Sicily, 166; told by Samuel Rogers, 
176-1S2; the Persian and the sun, 17 ; 
Benjamin West and the baby, 180; the 
disappointed lady's poem, 180; a lady's 
"no" means "yes," 1S1; Sir Walter 
Scott and the button, 1S1; Lincoln at 
Five Points, ^y, Lincoln's cabinet, 
343; Civil War incidents, 34S, 349; in 
Holt Memorial, 399-401; William Al- 
len Butler's Bible knowledge, 401-403. 

Antietam, 363. 

"Argonauts, The New," 202. 

Argyle, Duke of, 354. 

Appleton, William II., 349. 

Appellate Division Memorial, 417. 

Arbuthnot and Ambrister, 124. 

Aries, 156. 

Association of the Bar. Sec Bar Associa- 
tion, American Mar Association. 

Astor Library, 324. 

"At Richmond," 506. 

Avignon, 156. 



431 



INDEX 



Baldwin, Justice Henry, 50. 

Baltimore, visited, 47; in campaign of 
1844, 140; convention of 1852, 241. 

Bancroft, George, Secretary of Navy, 149; 
minister to England, 149; in London, 
174; Mrs. Bancroft's letter about Sam- 
uel Rogers, 182; in New York, 304; in 
Washington, 412. 

Barker, Jacob, 15. 

Bar Association, William Allen Butler's 
address on Revision and Revisers, 7; 
Holt Memorial, 391; William Allen 
Butler one of the founders, 403 ; Presi- 
dent of New York and American Bar 
Association, 403, 420. 

Barbour, William, 196. 

Barn Burners, The, 189, 241. 

Barney, Hiram, partnership with, 211; 
takes Lincoln to Five Points, 333; ap- 
pointed collector, 349; resigned, 350; 
Emancipation Proclamation read to, 
352; Holt Memorial, 393. 

Barney, Butler, and Parsons, 212. 

Barney, Humphrey, and Butler, 212. 

Barnum, P. T., Jenny Lind, 233. 

" Barnum's Parnassus," 235. 

Bates, Edward, 336, 343. 

Beaureguard, General, 347. 

Bell's tavern, 140. 

Bell, John, 337. 

Benedict, Robert D., 424. 

Berlin, 173. 

Benton, Thomas H., 299. 

Bethune, Rev. George W., 319. 

Bible, New York Bible Society meeting, 
370; William Allen Butler's knowledge 
of, 401-403; "Bible by itself," 412. 

Bidwell, Marshall S., 319. 

Biggar cases, 193-195. 

Black, Jeremiah S., 340. 

Black Ball Line, 62, 228. 

Black Warrior affair, 266. 

" Bleeding Kansas." See Kansas. 

Booth, Alfred, 247. 

Booth, Lydia Allen (Butler), 247, 318. 

Border Ruffians in Kansas, 255-257. 

Boston, Anthony Burns incident. 271. 

"Boz," 93. 

Branford, Conn., 17. 

Breckinridge, John C., Vice-President, 

3°°. 337- 



Bright, John, 354. 

Brooks, Preston, assault on Sumner, 261; 
effect in North, 261 ; action of Congress, 
262; death, 263. 

Brougham, Lord, 315. 

Brown, John, anticipated by Garrison, 
80; Ossawatomie, 258; raid at Har- 
per's Ferry, 330, 331; "John Brown's 
Body" (song), 332; raid condemned, 

338. 

Brown (sexton), 203. 

Bryant, William Cullen, 176. 

Buchanan, James, Secretary of State, 148; 
candidate, 241; Ostend Manifesto, 
269; nominated, 300; elected Presi- 
dent, 301; character, 301, 302; Dred 
Scott decision, 327; attitude in i860, 
339; his cabinet, 340; changes, 341; 
lack of courage, 341. 

Bucktails, The, 129. 

Bull Run, 357. 

Bunker's Mansion House, 84. 

Burgundy, The, sailing-packet, 101. 

Burr, Aaron, Wirt's speech, 51; William 
Allen Butler sees, 84; described, 85. 

Burns, Anthony, 271. 

Butler, Andrew P., 260, 263. 

Butler, Arthur W T ellman, 381. 

Butler, Benjamin Franklin (father of 
William Allen Butler), home at Albany, 
7; reviser of Statutes, 7; parentage 
and family, 20; Delavan- James con- 
troversy, 23, 25; relations with Van 
Buren, ^3, 44; leaves Albany, 34; pro- 
fessional eminence, 34; New York and 
New Jersey Boundary Commission, 36; 
Albany Regency, 37; letter from Jack- 
son offering attorney-generalship, 39- 
43; letter from Albany citizens, 44; has 
slave employee, 81; episode of the slave 
wife, 82; Washington life, 84; at Bunk- 
er's, in New York, 84; refuses Van Bu- 
ren's offer, 89; retires, 90; letter from 
Felix Grundy, 90; attorney-general and 
Secretary of War, 99; United States Dis- 
trict Attorney, 105, 149; Washington 
Place home, no; University of New- 
York, no; law school, 1 1 1 ; letter from 
Justice Story, 11 1; Silas Wright and 
Van Buren, 141, 144; letter from Walk- 
er, 145; Polk offers war portfolio, 146; 



432 



INDEX 



declines, 147; letter of Tilden, 147; 
Polk's conduct, 148; rupture with Polk, 
209; resumes private practice, 209; 
Free Soil Party, 244; death of wife, 246; 
connection with Presbyterian Church, 
248; verses, 250; important litigations, 
3 I 3~3 I 5; he lp s to found Free Soil Party, 
315; supports Fremont and Dayton, 
316; last appearance in court, 316; 
Levy cases, 316, 317; sails for Europe, 
318; dies in Paris, 313, 318; funeral 
services, 319; resolutions of Bar, 320; 
Holt Memorial, 391. 

Butler, Benjamin Franklin, Jr. (William 
Allen Butler's brother), 97, 231, 247. 

Butler, General Benjamin Franklin, 
Massachusetts politician, 362. 

Butler, Charles (William Allen Butler's 
uncle), travels with, 92, 95, 98, 99, 101. 

Butler, Charles Henry, 355, 409. 

Butler, Charles Marshall, 231. 

Butler, Elias, 16. 

Butler, Eliza Ogden (Mrs. Charles But- 
ter), 92, 95, 98. 

Butler, Eliza Ogden (Kirkbride), 98, 247, 
318. 

Butler, Ezekiel, 16. 

Butler, George Prentiss, 355. 

Butler, Harriet (Allen) (William Allen 
Butler's mother), 9, 39, 44, 246; death, 
246; family, 247; funeral, 249; grave, 
250. 

Butler, Harriet Allen (Dwight), 97, 247. 

Butler, Harriet Allen (daughter), 355. 

Butler, Howard Russell, 355, 392, 427. 

Butler, Jonathan, 16. 

Butler, John Crosby, 375, 381. 

B utler, Lydia Allen (Mrs. Booth), 247, 318. 

Butler, Margaret Crosby (daughter), 381. 

Butler, Margaret Barker (Crosby), 247. 

Butler, Mary Howard (Lord), 31, 247. 

Butler, Mary Marshall (daughter), 355. 

Butler, Mary Russell (Marshall) (wife of 
William Allen Butler), dedication, pref- 
ace, vii; marriage, 22S; anecdote, 229; 
wedding trip, 2^0; Horace Greeley, 
232; journey in Catskills, 370; Round 
Oak, 379. 

Butler, Medad, name, 16; book of de- 
scendants, 16; Kinderhook, 17; anec- 
dote 19, wife's family, 20. 



Butler, Notman and Mynderse, 212. 

Butler, Notman, Joline, and Myn-lcrse, 
212. 

Butler, Ogden, 92, 99. 

Butler, Stillman and Hubbard, 212. 

Butler, William Allen, Jr., 212, 232. 

Butler, William Allex. General Bi- 
ography: See Table of Contents (p. 
xi), and headings of chapters. 
Career at Bar: Admitted at Utica, 
151; United States attorney's office, 
193; early cases, 194; the Fresnel 
light, 199; Wall Street office, 210; 
the office boy, 210; partners, 211; 
offices, 212; business methods, 213; 
William Allen Butler's review of his 
own career, 214-216; admiralty 
cases, 216; Memorials: by Judge 
Holt, 391-416; Appellate Division, 
417-423; United States District 
Court, 424-426; by Judge Parker, 
in Court of Appeals, 427-429. 
Letters. See Letters, in Index. 
School and College: Albany Acad- 
emy, 29; Greenbush and Schodack 
Academy, 29, 30; Georgetown, Silas 
Hill, 62; James McVean, 62; Hud- 
son, Cyrus Huntington, 62; Univer- 
sity Grammar School, 86, 116; Uni- 
versity of N. Y., 116; class of 1843, 



11: 



Poems: Class Poet, 112; "The Future," 
112; "Our Fifty-fifth," 115; -The 
Wanderer," 153; "Vaucluse," 156; 
Titian's "Assumption," 172; "The 
Inversnaid Inn," 184; "The New 
Argonauts," 202; "The Carnival of 
1848," 202; "The Sexton and the 
Thermometer," 203, 406; "Barnum's 
Parnassus," 235; "Sea Scribblings," 
235; "Nothing to Wear." history, 
274; reviews, 284; p J; quota- 

tions, 414, 427, 428; "AtRichmoi 
307; "Two Millions," ; 10. 411,414; 
Lines on the death of F. B. C. 559; 
"Home Poems," 380; "Tom Tv. 
381; "Somebody." 381, 408; qu 
tions from " 1 >obbs 1 lis Ferry," 400; 
"A ( '.olden Wedding," 409; "Gen- 
eral Average," 410; " ( >ur Mother 
Church," 415; "Nothing to Wear 



433 



INDEX 



and other Poems" — edition of 187 1, 
310; edition of 1898, 185. 
Travels: Trip to Utica, 31; to Wash- 
ington, 46; to Europe in 1838, 92; 
descriptions, 95; return voyage 
broken up, 100; Ireland, 101; Pom- 
peii, 102; Genoa, 104; trip to the 
Hermitage, 118; by stage coach re- 
turn trip, 120; Mammoth Cave, 140; 
to Europe, in 1846, 151; views on 
travel, 152; Caen, 154; Paris, 155; 
Southern France, 156; Italy, Genoa, 
157; trip up Vesuvius, 159, 162; 
Sicily, 164; Rome, 168; Americans 
in, 170; Florence, Venice, 171, 172; 
Berlin, 173; Scotland, 183, 184; 
writes for The Literary World, 184; 
185; returns via Boston, 185; trip 
to Richmond, 306. 
Works: "The Book of the Family 
and Lineal Descendants of Medad 
Butler," 161; "Mrs. Limber's Raf- 
fle," 239, 412; "Martin Van Buren, 
Lawyer, Statesman, and Man," 368; 
" The Relations between Lawyer 
and Client," 412; "Domesticus," 
412; "The Bible by Itself," 412; 
Contributions to Democratic Review, 
112, 185; to Literary World, 185; to 
Harper's Weekly, 282. 
Butler, William Allen, Jr., 212, 232. 
Butler, Mrs. William Allen. See Butler, 

Mary Russell (Marshall). 
Caen, 154, 155. 
Caffe Greco, Rome, 170. 
Calderon, Sefior, 266. 
Calhoun, John C, Missouri Compromise, 
77; nullification, 133; Jefferson dinner 
toast, 134; Secretary of State, 143; 
last appearance, 219; funeral, 230. 
California, ceded by Mexico, 186; gov- 
ernment for, 188; discovery of gold, 
195; "The New Argonauts," 202. 
Cameron, Simon, 336, 343. 
Capri, 162. 

Carlyle, Thomas, 174. 
Cases, reviewed in memorials, 393 - 399> 
41S, 419, 424-426. See Career at Bar. 
Cass, Lewis A., 42; in Paris, 99; nomina- 
tion and defeat, 190; candidate, 241; 
Secretary of State, 340. 



Chamberlin, Lydia, 29, 30, 62. 

Chamberlin, Nathan, 62. 

Chancellorsville, 359. 

Channing, William E., 273. 

Charleston, S. C, 342. 

Chase, Salmon P., abolitionist, 240; Free 
Soil Party, 244; opposes the Kansas- 
Nebraska Bill, 255; candidate, 336; in 
cabinet, 343, 350. 

Chicago Gas Trust, reorganization case, 
419. 

Choate, Rufus, 131. 

"Church, Our Mother," poem, 415. See 
Presbyterian Church. 

Cilley, Jonathan, 86. 

Civil War, as observed by William Allen 
Butler, 5; causes and commencement 
of, 329, 330; anecdotes, 348; brief re- 
view, 350-354; progress of, 3 5 7-3 59 ; 
volunteers, 358; death and grief, 359; 
cost and results, 364; progress of, 368; 
effect on election of 1864, 369; Appo- 
mattox, 372. 

Civita Vecchia, 158. 

Class of 1843, nst °f members, 113; class 
dinners, 114; resolution, 114, 115; 
fifty-fifth reunion, 115. See Univer- 
sity of New York. 

Clay, Henry, attitude on slavery, 75; the 
Missouri Compromise, 76; candidate, 
106; relations with Jackson, 125; Mrs. 
Clay, 125, 126; Texas, 143; Polk, 144: 
returns to Senate, 218; Wilmot Pro- 
viso, 219; compromise of 1850, 226. 

Clinch, Charles P., 129. 

Clinton, De Witt, 38, 128, 130. 

Cobb, Howell, 340. 

Cobden, Richard, 354. 

Cockran, W. Bourke, 404. 

" Colonel's Club, The," 202. 

Columbia County, 365. See Kinderhook, 
Hudson. 

Confederate States, 347; and England, 

354- 

Congress, 58. See Missouri Compromise; 
Wilmot Proviso; Slavery; Kansas. 

Congress Hall Hotel, 29. 

Constitution of United States, conven- 
tion to form, 69; compromises, 70, 73; 
slavery, 70-72; compact, 341. 

" Contraband," 362. 



434 



INDEX 



Conventions, Constitutional, 1787, 69; 
Democratic, 1844, at Baltimore, 141; 
1848, at Utica, 190; Free Soil, 1848, 
240; Democratic, 1852, 243; Free Soil, 
1852, 244; Republican, 1856, at Phila- 
delphia, 299; Democratic, 1856, 300; 
Republican, i860, at Chicago, 344; 
Democratic, i860, 337; Democratic, 
1864, 370- 

Court of Appeals Memorial. 427. 

Coventry, Dr. and Mrs. Charles B., 31. 

Cox, Samuel S., 355, 356. 

Cranch, Christopher P., 170. 

Craven Street, 175. 

Crawford, Thomas, 170, 306. 

Crawford, William, H., 10, 77. 

Cromwell, Oliver, 16. 

Crosby, Franklin Butler, 359, 376. 

Crosby, Professor Howard, 356. 

Crosby, John P., 246, 357, 375, 376. 

Crosby, Margaret Barker (Butler), 247, 

357- 

Croswell, Edwin, 37, 43. 

Crystal Palace, 245. 

Cuba, attempts to acquire, 264- 270; 
Marcy and Soule, 264; the Black War- 
rior, 266; General Quitman, 267; Os- 
tend Manifesto, 268-270; Spanish rule 
ended, 270. 

Cullen, Chief Judge, 429. 

Curtis, Benjamin R., 328. 

Curtis, George, no. 

Curtis, George William, no, 170, 282- 
284. 

Cutts, James Madison, 304. 

Cutts, Adele Douglas, 304. 

Daly, Charles P., 236. 

Dana, Richard H., Jr., 271. 

Davis, Jefferson, visit to Pierce, 254; 
Cuba, 264; Quitman, 267; attitude on 
slavery, 304; President of Confederacy, 

347- 
Day, Henry, 231. 
Dayton, William L., 299. 
Decatur, Commodore, 11. 
Delavan, Edward C, 21-26, 42. 
Democratic Review, 112, 185. 
Diamond (a horse), 8. 
Dickens, Charles, 93, 94, 100 
District of Columbia, 227. 



Dix, John A., 37, 43, 340. 

" Dobbs His Ferry," 406-408. 

"Domesticus," 412. 

Donelson, Andrew J., 54, 173. 

Douglas, Stephen A., candidate, 241; 
Nebraska Bill, 252; popular sover- 
eignty, 253; relations with Pierce and 
Davis, 254; amendments, 255; Sum- 
ner's opposition, 260; not nominated, 
300; opposed to Buchanan, 302; per- 
sonal appearance, 304; attitude on 
slavery, 304; Lincoln debates, 329, 
330; nominated for presidency, 337; 
becomes Lincoln supporter, 345. 

Draper, Simeon, 350. 

Dred Scott decision, 327, 328. 

Duer, John, 8, 9, 105. 

Duvall, Justice Gabriel, 50. 

Duyckinck, Evert A., 202, 203, 276, 322. 

Duyckinck, George L., tra%'els, with Will- 
iam Allen Butler, 151, 162, 193, 315; 
The Literary World, 202; Library, 322. 

Dwight, Edmund, 247. 

Dwight, Harriet Allen (Butler), 97, 247. 

Edmonds, John W., 319. 
Edwards, Margaret, 16. 
Elmer, Lucius Q. C, 37. 
Emancipation, 352, 362-364. See also 

Abolition. 
Embler, John W., 357. 
Emigrant Aid Society, 256. 
Emmons, Hannah, 20. 
England and the Confederacy, 354. 
English, William H., 305. 
English Bill, 306. 
Evarts, William M., 231. 
Evelyn, John, 3. 
Everett, Edward, 337. 

Fielding, Henry, 130. 
Fifth Avenue Bank v. Colgate, 397, 4T0. 
Fillmore, Millard, 226, 301. 
Firms and partners of William Allen But- 
ler, 212, 2I3, 394- 
Fish, Hamilton, 319. 
Flagg, Azariah C, 37, 43- 
Florence, Italy, 171. 

rida, The, 354. 
Floyd, John B., 340. 
Folger, Peter, 247. 



435 






INDEX 



Forsyth, John, 78, 79. 

Fourth National Bank v. Francklyn, 398. 

Fox, Charles James, parliamentary leader, 

61. 

Fox, Mr., British Minister, 61. 

France, travels in, 1 '4-156. 

Franklin, Benjamin, 46-48, 177. 

Frazier, Sir William, 157, 158. 

Free Soil Party, organized, 189; growth, 
192; Buffalo convention, 240-241; 
Chase and Benjamin F. Butler, 244; 
platform, 298; Benjamin F. Butler's 
attitude, 315; platform reiterated, 337. 

Frelinghuysen, Theodore, 36, 37, 141. 

Fremont, John C, nominated, 299; Ben- 
jamin F. Butler supports, 316; eman- 
cipation efforts, 363. 

Freshfield, Mr., 314. 

Fresnel Lantern suit, 198-202. 

Fugitive Slave Law, enacted, 74; Clay's 
support, 219; Webster's, 224; effect 
on elections, 240; constitutionality, 
244; Anthony Burns case, 270-272; 
platform silence, 338. 

"Future, The," 112. 

Garrison, William Lloyd, 80. 

General Average, 410, 411. 

Geneva Award, 354. 

Genoa, 156, 157. 

Georgetown, D. C, 62, 63, 65. 

Giddings, Joshua R., 224. 

Gilpin, Henry D., 274. 

"Golden Wedding, A," 409. 

Grace Church, 203. 

Graham, David, in. 

Grant, Ulysses S., 233, 369, 372. 

Graves, William J., 86, 87. 

Great Britain. See England. 

Greenbush and Schodack Academy, 29. 

Greeley, Horace, next door neighbor, 232; 

anecdote, 232; campaign, 232; N. Y. 

Tribune, 233; death and funeral, 233; 

"Nothing to Wear," 280. 
Gregory XVI, 168. 
Grundy, Felix, 90. 
Guadalupe-Hidalgo treaty, 186. 



Halifax, 185. 

Hall, J. Prescott, 202. 

Hall, Robert, 3. 



Hallam, Henry, 175. 

Halleck, Fitz-Greene, 14, 16, 129-133. 

Hamilton, Alexander, 68. 

Hamlin, Hannibal, 58-60, 336, 338. 

Harper, Fletcher, 282. 

Harper's Ferry, 120, 330. 

Harpers, The, 274, 282-284. 

Harrison, William H., defeated, 1836, 87; 
campaign of 1840, 106-108; election 
and death, 109; office-seekers, no. 

Haussmann, Baron, 155. 

Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 242, 243. 

Hayes, Rutherford B., 15. 

Hermitage, The. See Jackson, Andrew. 

Hicks, Thomas, 170. 

Hill, Nicholas, 34. 

Hill, Silas (school-master), 62-64. 

Hitchcock, Roswell D., 371. 

Hoffman, Ogden, 106. 

Holmes, Oliver Wendell, 346. 

Holt, George C, memorial, 391. 

Holt, Joseph, 340. 

Homes of William Allen Butler, 231, 355, 

356, 379, 3 8 °- 
Hoppin, Augustus, 278. 
Howe, Samuel G., 331, 332. 
Howells, William Dean, 284, 288. 
Hoyt v. Sprague, 398, 419. 
Hubbard, Thomas H., 212. 
Hudson, N. Y., home of Aliens, 9; school 

at, 62 ; founding of city, 247. 
Humboldt, Baron von, 173. 
Humphrey, James, 212. 
Huntington, Rev. Cyrus. 62. 
Hyde v. King, 397. 

"Ichabod," 225. 
"Inversnaid Inn, The," 184. 
Ireland, 101. 

Jackson, Andrew, offers Benjamin F. 
Butler attorney-generalship, 39-43 5 
William Allen Butler sees, 52; "Old 
Hickory," 53; personality, 54; The 
White House, 60; Grundy letter, 90; 
William Allen Butler's proposed visit 
to the Hermitage, 118; arrival, 121; 
family life, 122; views on religion, anec- 
dotes, 123; Arbuthnot and Ambrister, 
124; Poindexter, 123; relations with 
Clay, 125, 126; religious views, 127; 



43 ^ 



INDEX 



the New York toast, 128-133; Jeffer- 
son dinner toast, 133-134; views on 
Van Buren, 134; letter to a young man, 
135-137; favors Van Buren and Polk, 
137; slaves at Hermitage, 138; com- 
pared with Buchanan, 341. 

Jackson, Andrew, Jr., adopted son, 121; 
wife, 138. 

James, Dr. Edwin, 23-25. 

Jay, John, 68. 

Jay, Peter A., 36. 

Jefferson, Thomas, designs columns in the 
Capitol, 49; purchases Louisiana, 74; 
birthday dinner toast, 133. 

Jennings, Chester, 85. 

Jenny Lind, 233-235. 

Joline, Adrian H., 212. 

Jones, 87. 

Jones v. Guaranty & Indemnity Co., 

397- 

Jones, Colonel John, 16. 

Jones, Mabel, 16. 

Johnson, Professor Ebenezer A., 112. 

Johnson, Herschel V., 337. 

Johnson, Justice William, 50. 

Juilliard v. Chaffee, 397. 

Juilliard v. Greenman, 398, 419. 

Kansas, Kansas-Nebraska Bill, 255; 
elections in, 256; "Bleeding Kansas," 
2 57»3° 2 ; John Brown, 258, 332; Sum- 
ner's speech, 260; Border Ruffians, 302; 
constitutional convention, 303; Eng- 
lish Bill, 305, 306; Benjamin Franklin 
Butler denounces bill, 316; Lincoln- 
Douglas debates, 329. 

Keitt, Representative, 262, 263. 

Kensctt, John F., 170. 

Kent, Chancellor, in. 

Kent, William, in, 314, 319. 

Kinderhook, N. Y., 2, 17. See Van 
Buren. 

King, Charles, 314. 

King, Horatio, 340, 341. 

King, William R., 241, 245. 

Kirkbride, Eliza Ogden (Butler), 98, 99, 
247, 318. 

Kirkbride, Thomas S., 247. 

Lafayette, General, 63, 68. 
Lane, Joseph, 337. 



Latimer, Mrs., 61. 

Lawrence, Amos A., 257. 

Lawrence, Kansas, 257. 

Lawyer and client, relations between the, 

412. 
Lecompton Constitution, 302-306. 
Lee, Genl. Robert E., 372. 
Leghorn, 158. 

Lenox Library, 202, 323, 326. 
Letters: Benjamin Franklin Butler to 
his wife, 29, 31; William Allen Butler 
to Mrs. Chamberlin, 30; to mother, 
32; Chief Justice Savage to Benjamin 
Franklin Butler, 35, 36; Van Buren to 
Benjamin Franklin Butler, 39-43; Al- 
bany citizens to Benjamin Franklin 
Butler, 44; to and from Benjamin 
Franklin Butler and his wife, 44; Yaux 
to Van Buren, 46-48; Silas Hill to 
Benjamin Franklin Butler, 64; Will- 
iam Allen Butler's sister to family, 65; 
William Allen Butler to mother, 65, 66; 
Forsyth to Van Buren, 78; William 
Allen Butler to his father, 86; Felix 
Grundy to Benjamin Franklin Butler, 
90; William Allen Butler to parent-, 
95-98; to "Lizzy," 98; Justice Story 
to Benjamin Franklin Butler, 111-112; 
Halleck to William Allen Butler, 130, 
132; William Allen Butler to Halleck, 
131; Andrew Jackson to H, 135-137; 
Silas Wright to Benjamin Franklin 
Butler, 141, 144; Walker to Benjamin 
Franklin Butler, 145; Polk to Benja- 
min Franklin Butler, 146; Tilden I 1 
Benjamin Franklin Butler, 146, 147; 
Bancroft to Benjamin Franklin Butler, 
149; William Allen Butler to family, 
156; William Allen Butler to mother, 
167; William Allen Butler to father, 
170, 171; William Allen Butler to -N- 
ter, 171, 172; Mrs. Bancroft to Will- 
iam Allen Butler, 1S3; William Allen 
Butler to John Marshall Club. 214; 
Chase to Benjamin Franklin Butler, 
244; Benjamin franklin Butler to 
Chase, 244; to Gilpin, 274; Curtis to 
William Allen Butler, 284; Oliver Wen- 
dell Holmes to Motley, 346. 
Levy, I'riah P., 317. 
Lewis, Professor Tayler, 112. 



437 



INDEX 



Liberator, The, 80, 81. 

Library, William Allen Butler's, 384-386. 

Lincoln, Abraham, Free Soil Party, 192; 
Douglas debates, 329; Cooper Union 
speech, 332; friendship with Hiram 
Barney, 2>?>y, Chicago convention, 334; 
nominated, 336; cabinet, 343; Will- 
iam Allen Butler first saw, 344; inaug- 
uration, 345; Sumter, 345; Barney's 
appointment, 349; Draper's appoint- 
ment, 3 50; Emancipation, 352, 362-364; 
re-election, 369, 370; assassination, 373; 
Punch's tribute, 374; monument, 375. 

Lindenwald, 2, 109, 365. 

Lind, Jenny, 233. 

Literary World, The, 184, 202, 323. 

Liverpool, England, 94. 

Liverpool, etc., Insurance Co. v. Gun- 
trier, 398, 419. 

Liverpool, etc., Co. v. Phoenix Insurance 
Co., 396. 

London, England, William Allen Butler 
visits, 94; George Bancroft and Samuel 
Rogers, 174-182; Craven Street, 175. 

Longfellow, Henry W., 273. 

Lord, Daniel, 231, 261, 319. 

Lord, Daniel DeForest, 31, 231, 247. 

Lord, John C, 231. 

Lord, Mary Howard (Butler), 31, 247. 

Lottawanna, The, 216, 396. 

Lotteries, 237-239. 

Louis, Philippe, 155. 

Louisiana Purchase, 75. 

Lutz, Stephen, 198-202. 

Macaulay, Lord, 174. 

McClellan, General George B., 362, 370. 

MacFarlan, Mr., 314. 

McLean, Justice John, 42, 50. 

McVean, James, 62, 65. 

Macy, Mary Allen, 62, 63. 

Mac v, Robert J., 62, 63. 

Macy, Rev. William Allen, 63. 

Madison, James, 13, 70. 

Mammoth Cave, 140. 

Mann, Horace, 224. 

Marcy, William L., friend of Benjamin 
Franklin Butler, 34; Albany Regency, 
37; Alexander's Political History of 
New York, 38; Van Buren refers to, 
43; position in 1844, 147; Secretary of 



War, 148; candidate, 241; Cuba, 264; 
Ostend Manifesto, 270. 

Marriage, William Allen Butler's, 228. 

Marseilles, 156. 

Marshall, Charles H., William Allen But- 
ler marries daughter, 228; William Al- 
len Butler's trip to Richmond with, 306; 
assists Chase, 343; Sumter flag, 348; 
death, 376; memorials of, 379. 

Marshall, John, Chief-Justice, 50. 

Marshall, Mary Russell (Mrs. William 
Allen Butler). See Butler, Mary Rus- 
sell (Marshall). 

Martineau, Harriet, 277. 

Mason, John Y., 268, 319. 

Mason and Dixon's Line, 57. 

Memorials. See Resolutions and Me- 
morials. 

Merrimac and Monitor, 361. 

Metcalf, Theodore, 155, 157, 162. 

Mexico, war with, 185; cedes California, 
186; slavery questions, 187; Wilmot 
Proviso, 188. 

Miller, Peyton F., 365. 

Missouri, admission, 75; Compromise, 
76; efforts to repeal, 251-254. 

Monitor and Merrimac, 361. 

Monroe, James, 76, 77. 

Montagu, Lady Mary, 130. 

Montana, The, 216, 396. 

Moore, George H., 323. 

Morris, Gouverneur, 71. 

Morris, Luke, 47. 

Moultrie, Fort, 342. 

"Mrs. Limber's Raffle," 239, 412. 

Mynderse, Wilhelmus, 212, 213. 

Nantucket Island, 9, 247. 

Naples, 158, 167. 

Napoleon III, 354. 

Narducci, 101. 

Nashville, Tenn., 119, 120. 

Nebraska Bill, 252, 253. 

Nelson, Mr. Justice, 36, 202, 319. 

"New Argonauts, The," 202. 

Newburgh, 356. 

New Jersey boundary, 36, 37. 

New Mexico, 188, 227. 

New York, Benjamin Franklin Butler 
moves to, 84; city in 1837, 85; Will- 
iam Allen Butler's homes in, 355. 



438 



INDEX 



New York Boundary Commission, 36, 37. 
New York Public Library, 324, 326, 421. 
"Nickel Plate" case, 398, 402. 

North American Trust and Banking Co. 
cases, 313. 

Northwest Ordinance, 69, 72. 

"Nothing to Wear," publication, 274-276; 
popularity, 277; in German, 278; au- 
thorship, 279, 281; republished, 282; 
reviewed by Howells, 284; the poem, 
288; quotations from, 404, 413-415, 
428. 

Notman, John, 212, 213. 

Nott, Eliphalet, 21. 

Noyes, William Curtis, 314, 321. 

Nullification, 



l 33- 

O'Conor, Charles, 238, 314, 325. 

Ohio River, 121. 

Old Hunkers, 189, 241. 

Oregon, 185, 188. 

Osgood, James R. & Co., 310. 

Ossawatomie, 258. 

Ostend Manifesto, 268, 270. 

"Our Fifty-fifth," 115, „6. 

Pacific, The, 197, 198. 

Palmer, J. Horsely, 314. 

Palmer, McKellop & Dent, 313. 

Palmer, Roundell, 314. 

Parker, Alton P., 427. 

Parker, James, 37. 

Parker, Theodore, 271, 331. 

Parker, Dr. Willard, 231. 

Paris, 155. 

Parodies, by William Allen Butler, 

235- 
Parsons, George W., 212. 
Parsons, John E., 417. 
Patrici, 162. 

" Peacemaker, The," 143. 
Pennsylvania, The, 92, 396, 418, 425. 
People v. Vanderbilt, 395, 419. 
Pepys, 3. 

Phi Beta Kappa, 309. 
Philadelphia, 46, 47. 
Phillips, Wendell, 271. 
"Pickwick Papers," 93. 
Pierce, Franklin, nominated, 241; Haw- 
thorne, 242; elected, 245; at Crystal 

Palace, 245; first message, 251; Ne- 
braska Bill, 254; review of adminis- 



tration, 264; Quitman, 26S; Anthony 
Burns, 271; not renominated, 300. 
Pinckney, Mr., 41. 
"Pink, Diggory," 204. 
Pius IX, 168, 169. 
Poems. See Butler, William Allen. 
Poindexter, George, 123, 124. 
Polk, James K., 137; views on Texas, 144 
relations with Benjamin Franklin But- 
ler, 146-148; appointments, 149; war 
with Mexico, 185, 186; rupture with 
Benjamin Franklin Butler, 203. 
Pompeii, 102, 162, 163. 
Popes of Rome, 168. 
Popular Sovereignty, 253, 300, 338. 
Portraits of Revisers, 7, 8; of William 

Allen Butler, 427. 
Potsdam, 173. 
Powers, Hiram, 170. 
Prentiss, Dr. George L., 249, 250, 357, 

375- 
Presbyterian Church, Jackson joins, 127; 
Benjamin Franklin Butler's connec- 
tion with, 248; William Allen Butler's, 
248; Mercer Street Church, 249; mot- 
to of Scotch Church, 356; poem, "Our 
Mother Church," 415. 
Prescott, 176. 
Puteoli, 158. 
Price, William M., 105. 
Punch, 374. 

Quakers, 72, 229, 247. 
Quitman, General, 267, 268. 

Rallies, 239. 

Railroad Co. v. Lockwood, 396. 

Randolph, John, 58. 

Rantoul, Robert Jr., 259. 

Ranney, Judge, 402. 

Rebellion. See Civil War. 

Reed, Louis B., 114. 

Reeder, Andrew H., 256. 

Republican Party, created, 299; Fremont 
and Dayton, 299; platform, 300; nom- 
ination of Lincoln, 334 336; platform, 
^60, 337; election, 338; William Allen 
Butler, 415. 

Resolutionsand Memorials: Classof 1843, 
1 1 1; University of New Y,, r k. 1 ■ 
Union League Club, 377; memorials 



439 



INDEX 



of Charles H. Marshall, 379; of Benja- 
min Franklin Butler, 320; Holt Me- 
morial, 391-416; Appellate Division, 
417-423; United States District Court, 
424-426. 

Revised Statutes, 7, 8. 

Revision and Revisers, 8. 

Rheims, 156. 

Rhodes, "History of the United States," 
cited, 254, 257, 261, 265, 306, 347, 359- 

Rich v. N. Y. Central R.R., 4^9- 

Richmond, Va., 306. 

Rochefort, Henri, 1. 

Roenne, Baron Von, 61. 

Rogers, Samuel, 175, 182. 

Rome, 101, 167-170. 

"Round Oak," 380. 

Rudd & Carleton, 278, 280. 

Ruskin, 177. 

Russell, Esther Steele (Mrs. Lemuel 
Wellman), 228. 

Russell, Lord John, 175. 

Russell, Rev. Samuel, 228. 

Rutgers, Colonel Henry, 85. 

Ryer, Captain, 185. 

Saratoga, 84. 

Savage, Chief- Justice, 35. 

Saybrook, Conn., 16. 

School and College. See Butler, William 
Allen. 

Schurz, Carl, 76, 77, 107, 109. 

Scotch Church motto, 356. 

Scotland, 183, 184. 

Scotland, The, 216, 396, 418, 425. 

Scott, Dred. See Dred Scott decision. 

Scott, General, Mexican War, 186; can- 
didate, 191; aids Lincoln, 346. 

Scott, Walter, 181. 

"Sea Scribblings," 235. 

Secession, 339, 341, 342. 

Sedgwick, Theodore, 154. 

Selbourne, Lord, 314. 

Seward, William H., in Washington, 61; 
Kansas-Nebraska Bill, 255; "Irrepres- 
sible Conflict," 330; candidate at Chi- 
cago, 334-335; disappointment, 336; 
Secretary of State, 343; opposed to 
Barney, 350; Emancipation, 363. 

"Sexton and Thermometer, The," 203, 
287, 406. 



Seymour, Henry, 37. 

Shakespeare, 152. 

Sherman, General, 349. 

Shepard, Edward M., 39, 107, 109, 190, 
368. 

Sicily, 164-167. 

Sing, Philip, 47. 

Skinner, Dr. Thomas, 319. 

Slavery, effects of, in Washington, 54-56; 
William Allen Butler's views, 55; effect 
on social life, 56; origin and growth in 
United States, 67; abolitionism, 67; 
northwest ordinance, 69; not in Con- 
stitution, 70; irrepressible conflict, 72; 
Quakers, 72; history, 73; slave-trade 
abolished, 74; in Territories, 77; slaves 
employed, 81; escapes by Underground 
Railroad, 81; Sumner's speech on, 83; 
"Uncle Tom's Cabin," 83; at Her- 
mitage, 138; distinction of slaves, 139; 
Texas annexation and effect on, 142, 
145, 150; Mexican negotiations and 
Wilmot Proviso, 187, 188; agitation, 
217, 218; Clay and Calhoun, 218, 219; 
Webster's speech, 221-225; in District 
of Columbia, 227; pro-slavery aggres- 
sion, 251; Kansas-Nebraska Bill, 252; 
1856, Free Soil platform, 298; efforts 
to acquire Cuba for, 265-270; Anthony 
Burns, 270; Underground Railroad, 
272; anti-slavery literature, 273; North 
and South, 301; poem on, "At Rich- 
mond," 307; Dred Scott case, 327-329; 
Republican platform on, 337, 338; real 
issue in war, 351; Lincoln's attitude, 
352; Emancipation, 363; Dr. Tyng's 
speech, 371. See Fugitive Slave Law. 

Smith, Gerrit, 331. 

Smith, Mrs. Samuel H., 91. 

Smothers, John, 81. 

Snodgrass, Rev. William, 229. 

"Somebody," 381, 408, 409. 

Sorrento, 162. 

Soulc, Nelville, 265. 

Soule, Pierre, 264-269. 

South Carolina, 341. 

Spain and Cuba, 265, 270. 

Spencer, Ambrose, 28. 

Spencer, John C, 8. 

Sprague, Edward Everett, 28. 

Sprague, Dr. William B., 25, 28, 319. 



44O 



INDEX 



Squatter sovereignty, 253. 

Stage-coaches, 46, 120. 

Stanton, Rev. Benjamin F., 248. 

Stanton, Edwin M., 340. 

Stevenson v. Brooklyn Railway Co., 398, 
419. 

Stillman, Thomas E., 212. 

Story, Justice Joseph, 50, III, 112, 310. 

Stowe, Harriet Beecher, 273. 

Sturgis vs. Spofford, 216, 395, 418. 

Stuyvesant, N. Y., 17. 

Suburban life, 386. 

Sullivan, John L., 112. 

Sumner, Charles, speech on slavery, 83; 
opposed to Kansas-Nebraskan Bill, 
255; elected Senator from Massa- 
chusetts, 259; attacked by Brooks, 259; 
assails Democrats, 260; Brooks, 261; 
Congress, 262; character of, 263; Will- 
iam Allen Butler sees, 264. 

Sumner, William G., 53, 303. 

Sumter, Fort, 342, 347, 348. 

Supreme Court of United States, 49, 400. 

Sutherland, Judge, 34, 36. 

Swartwout, Samuel, 105. 

Talcott, 38. 

Taney, Chief Justice, Van Buren refers 
to, 41, 42; robing of Supreme Court 
Justices, 50; inaugurating Van Buren, 
89; Dred Scott case, 328. 

Tappan, Lewis, 211. 

Taylor, Bayard, 235. 

Taylor, General Zachary, Mexican War, 
186; nominated and elected, 190, 191; 
popularity, 192; cabinet and problems, 
217; death, 226; Fillmore succeeds, 
226; William Allen Butler's call on, 
230; Webster's panegyric, 230. 

Tennessee, 139. 

Territories, 252. 

Terry, Luther, 170. 

Texas, Van Buren on, 141, 142; revolts 
from Mexico, 142; annexation treaty, 
143; Clay and Van Buren oppose, 143; 
issue in 1844; Polk's attitude, 144; an- 
nexation and slaver)-, 145; war with 
Mexico, 185, 186. 

Thayer, Eli, 257. 

Thompson, Jacob, 340. 

Thompson, Justice Smith, 50, 78. 



Tilden, Samuel J., letter to Benjamin 
Franklin Butler, 147; speaks at Benja- 
min Franklin Butler meeting, 319; 
sketch of, 324; his will, 324; settle- 
ment, 325; Public Library, 325, 326; 
at Wan Buren's funeral with William 
Allen Butler, 365. 

Tippecanoe, 108. 

Titian's " Assumption," 172. 

"Tom Twist," 381. 

Toucey, Isaac, 340. 

Travels. See Butler, William Allen. 

Trist, Nicholas P., 187. 

Turbett, fellow-traveller, 157, 162, 164. 

Turgot, Marquis of, 265. 

"Two Millions," 309-312, 411, 414. 

Tylee, Hannah, 20. 

Tylee, Samuel, 20. 

Tyler, John, nomination and campaign, 
107-109; election and results, no; 
succeeds Harrison, 142; Texas, 142; 
"Peacemaker" explosion, and cabinet 
changes, 143, 144; Texas annexed, 

145- 
Tyng, Stephen H., 371. 

Uhland, the poet, 156. 

"Uncle Tom's Cabin," 83, 273. 

Underground Railroad, 81, 272. 

Union, the S.S., 196, 197. 

Union League Club, 377. 

Union Trust Co. v. N. Y., Chicago & St. 
Louis Railway, 398, 419. 

University of City of New York, William 
Allen Butler attends, no; Benjamin 
Franklin Butler and law school, in; 
professors, 112; class poet, 112; class of 
1843, II 3'< class dinners, 114; tribute 
to William Allen Butler, 114; "Our 
Fifty-fifth," 115; Resolutions of Coun- 
cil, 116. 

Utah, 22-j. 

Utica, N. Y., 31, 151. 

Van Brunt, Charles H., 4:2. 

Van Buren, Martin, autobiography, a; 

partner of Benjamin Franklin Butler, 
Secretary of State, 33; Albany Re- 
gencj',37; character, 39; Utter to Benja- 
min Franklin Butler, .,0-4. ;; relations 
with Benjamin Franklin Butler, 44; 



44 1 



INDEX 



saw-dust pudding story, 46-4S; letter 
from John Forsyth, 78; Saratoga home, 
84; elected president, 87; political 
career, 88; nicknames, 88; inaugura- 
tion and cabinet, 89; appoints Benja- 
min Franklin Butler district-attorney, 
105; campaign of 1840, 105-108; de- 
feat and return to Lindenwald, 109; 
Jackson favors him, 118; Silas Wright's 
letters about, 141, 144; not nominated, 
141; attitude on Texas, 141, 142, 143; 
stands by Polk, 144; letter from Walker 
about, 145; minister to England, 149; 
Free Soil nomination and defeat, 190; 
death and funeral, 365-368; William 
Allen Butler's biography of, 368. 

Van Buren, John, 43, 97, 99, 101. 

Van Schaick, Henry, 114. 

Vatican, The, 168, 169. 

"Vaucluse," 156. 

Vaux, Roberts, 46, 47. 

Venice, 171, 173. 

Vesuvius, 159-162. 

Victoria, Queen, 95, 96. 

Vienna, 173. 

Walker, Robert J., 145, 148, 189. 

Wallace, William J., 213. 

Wallace, Butler & Brown, 213. 

Walpole, Horace, 4. 

"Wanderer, The," 153. 

War. See Civil War. 

Warner v. Jaffray, 397. 

Washington, D. C, expenses of living in, 
1834, 42; journey to, 46; Fuller's Ho- 
tel, 47; slavery, 54, 57; social condi- 
tions, 55; public buildings, 58; John 
Randolph on, 58; Hannibal Hamlin 
on, 58; entertainments and foreign 
ministers, 60; Benjamin Franklin But- 
ler's residences, 61; incidents, 67; slave 
employees of Northerners, 81 ; William 
Allen Butler revisits in 1844, XI 9! vis- 
ited on wedding trip, 230. See also 
District of Columbia. 



Washington, George, writes Lafayette 
about slavery, 68; Constitutional Con- 
vention, 71; birthday in Rome, 170; 
Samuel Rogers on, 176. 

Watson, William H., n. 

Webster, Daniel, Van Buren refers to, 
41; defeated for presidency, 87; bets 
with Rufus Choate, 131; politics and 
views on Texas, 220; Wilmot, Proviso 
220; " Seventh of March Speech," 221; 
effect of, 224; "Ichabod," 225; attacks 
abolitionists, Secretary of State, 226; 
attitude on slavery, 227; panegyric on 
Taylor, 230; again in cabinet, 259. 

Weed, Thurlow, 38, 334, 335, 350. 

Wellman, Fidelia (Mrs. Charles H. Mar- 
shall), 228. 

Wellman, Dr. Lemuel, 228. 

Westminster Review, 277. 

Wetmore, Prosper M., 237. 

Wheaton, Henry, 173. 

White House, The, 60. 

White, Hugh L., 87. 

Whittier, John Greenleaf, 225, 273, 307. 

Willard's Hotel, 47. 

Wilmot, David, author of Proviso, 187; 
Mexican session and slavery, 188; re- 
newed, 218; Clay's oppositio 1. 219. 

Wilson, Henry, "Rise and Fall of Slave 
Power," cited, 68, 258, 263. 

Wilson, James Grant, 13. 

Wirt, William, 41, 50-52, 78. 

Wise, Henry A., 143. 

Woodbury, Justice Levi, 42, no. 

Wright, Silas, Albany Regency, 37; let- 
ters to Benjamin Franklin Butler, 141, 
144; Governor, 144; death, 145. 

Works. See Butler, William Allen. 

Yale College, 228. 

Yonker Street, 7. 

Yonkers, William Allen Butler moves to, 
379, 380; his life at, 387; surburban 
life, 387; interest in Yonkers, 413-421; 
speeches, 415. 



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